Parallel Instances
by MintyFeet
Summary: The year is 460 of the Freeport Calendar - 2378 of the Galactic Standard Calendar. Contact is coming. Jane Shepard and KN-6D1687, freshly graduated from Pilot-Titan School, are not ready. Nihlus Kryik and his loyal crew of the Lightspear, the newest Spectre Team to enter the galactic stage, are not ready. Nobody is. [Artwork by Sevoris. Parallel Instances is a reboot of ParaPro.]
1. Title Page

The year is 460 of the Freeport Calendar.

Rising from the foundations built by the Frontier Militia, the modern-day Systems Alliance represents relative peace, prosperity and harmonious relations between human and binary alike.

Now, they must face First Contact, and the trials that come with it.

Jane Shepard and KN-6D1687, freshly graduated from Pilot-Titan School, are not ready.

Nobody is.

 **URGENT URGENT URGENT URGENT**  
 **FUNCTION READ ERROR UCD-061 DELIVER MSG TO MPSD MAILROOM** |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||| **FUNCTION READ ERROR UCD-061 DELIVER MSG TO MPSD MAILROOM**  
 **URGENT URGENT URGENT URGENT**

The year is 2378 of the Galactic Standard Calendar.

Rocked by the sudden, catastrophic collapse of the Batarian Hegemony, the once-stable peace of Citadel Space has begun to fray.

With tensions rising and unease spreading, First Contact and the trials that come with it are an unwelcome surprise.

Nihlus Kryik and his loyal crew of the _Lightspear_ , the newest Spectre Team to enter the galactic stage, are not ready.

Nobody is.

Welcome to _Parallel Instances_ , a rewrite of the story _Parallel Processing._

Q: Why a re-write?

A: Recently, I did a full re-read of _Parallel Processing_ and was horrified to find that a) much of the story was incredibly inconsistent in terms of details, terminology, tone, narrative flow and general worldbuilding. This can mainly attributed to "early installment weirdness," and more egregiously a serious lack of planning on my part regarding certain details which would become central to the plot and the characters. There was also not nearly enough planning done in terms of character development - I challenge any of the readers of _Parallel Processing,_ as an example, to describe characters who were supposed to be important, like, Jane and KN, as "developed" or "fleshed out." A lot of narrative details and character development have been re-written for _Parallel Instances_ with the intention of making a more consistent story which flows better - and one which, ultimately, is just more enjoyable to read in the long run.

Q: Do I need to read _Parallel Processing_ to understand _Parallel Instances_?

A: Not at all! Certain narrative elements have been kept from _Parallel Processing_ \- and savvy readers of the previous work are sure to notice certain nods and details that have been put there for them - but, in many ways, it's probably best to go into this story blind as to avoid colouring your views of certain characters and events which have been changed for the re-write.

Q: What is the "Galactic Standard" timeline mentioned above?

A: Galactic Standard is an alternative dating system that's being used in _Parallel Instances._ If you look at the Mass Effect Wiki's Timeline page, all dates there are given in "Council Era" notation. To get the "Galactic Standard" date, just add 500 years to the CE date. Yes, this means that _Parallel Instances_ does indeed take place before the Geth Rebelions.


	2. ALLIANCE ARC I-i: PROLOGUE - Cadet

**ALLIANCE ARC I: PROLOGUE** _/ URGENT URGENT URGENT THE MTP BROADCAST SYSTEM HAS BEEN ACTIVATED URGENT URGENT URGENT /_ **  
PART ONE: "CADET"** _/ LOADING MESSAGE: ALL UNITS THIS IS -AGENCY- REPORT IN FOR TASKING ASAP/_  
 **Pilot School [LOCATION CLASSIFIED]** _/ LOADING MESSAGE: SAY AGAIN ALL UNITS THIS IS -AGENCY- REPORT IN FOR TASKING ASAP/_ **  
October 9th, 460 Freeport** _/ LOADING MTP-BS...COMPLETE. TWENTY-NINE ROUNDS LEFT IN MAGAZINE. FIRING...ZERO HITS CONFIRMED./_  
 _Come on, really? Nobody? I can't be the only one here. Wait, did I even turn this thing on?_  
 _I can't believe this shit. Come on, somebody pick up...gonna die of boredom at this rate._

* * *

Jane Shepard was awake twenty minutes before her internal alarm activated, and thirty before reveille; she was not alone. All one-hundred-twenty recruits - sixty human, sixty binary - who were hoping to pass muster and enter Pilot-Titan School were either already up or in the process of waking up. Heady with anticipation, the organic recruits put on their fatigues and the binaries locked into their combat rigs, chattering amongst themselves.

Clambering out of the bunk closest to the main entrance to the barracks, a thickly-built and well-tanned human man with a high-and-tight haircut banged a fist on the side of his bunk, and let out a loud cheer. "Sim day, suckers! We made it - who's hyped?"

"We still gotta make it past the sims, James," Jane pointed out as she buckled her belt and retrieved her sidearm from the footlocker beneath her bed. "I thought talking like that was bad mojo for jarheads, too."

"Be nice, Jane," the binary standing across the hall from Jane said, flashing his X-shaped faceplate-lights a bright pink. "Marines only have enough brainpower for two good one-liners a day - he's just saving up."

"Oof. Hurts, Ken, that really hurts," James Vega shouted back, grinning as he finished dressing himself. "Not all of us can be camper-bots that sit around crunching numbers all day, y'know."

KN snorted a laugh as he flexed his arms and rolled his armoured shoulders. "Turns out, being built like a cerametal shithouse doesn't do much to stop bullets, Jimbo. I'll take that any day."

"Yeah? Well - well fuck you too, KN," James replied, shrugging. "I got nothing."

"Ken was right," said the raven-haired woman to Jane's left. "Two smart lines a day, and James used both before bed this morning."

"Easy, Ashley," Jane said as the room broke out into laughter. "Might hurt his feelings."

Fully dressed, the recruits made their way out of the barracks via the main entrance; they passed by their showers and gymnasium, and entered the small mess hall which was reserved for their use. Unlike the main mess that they'd eaten at only once - on the day of their arrival - the room was little more than two long tables and an automated conveyor which dispensed prepackaged portions of food from the actual mess hall, which was somewhere else in the sprawling facility.

The recruits lined up, as they always did, filing along as they chose their breakfasts from what was available; Jane flipped through the menu of the dispenser and settled on a bowl of katong laksa and a mug of frothed milk with a double helping of stim. KN, as per usual, got the same breakfast she'd seen him eat every day since they'd entered the PIlot-Titan Testing program - one cup of soup, chosen at random (today's being a cream-of-tomato), one cup of plain oatmeal and a piece of toast with more butter than bread on it. Jane and KN, as they always did, sat together, and tore into their food with gusto; the recruits wasted no time talking until all of them had finished their food - and not more than a few seconds after the last of them had cleared their plates, the doors to the mess hall swung open, revealing three individuals.

The first to step through the doors was a tall, lanky man in dress uniform, his shaved red hair blending smoothly into a neatly-trimmed beard; following closely behind was a Pilot in a full set of combat gear, complete with helmet and jump kit, and a binary wearing a heavily-armoured humanoid infantry chassis which bore no decoration on its boxy face save for a single vertical light.

The recruits stood at attention, earning an approving nod from the man in the dress-uniform.

"GOOD MORNING, RECRUITS," the man shouted. "I am happy - no, overjoyed - to see that you've all awake and fed."

"GOOD MORNING, SERGEANT SORENSEN!" the recruits shouted back, grins on their faces.

Sergeant Isaac Sorensen paced up and down the length of the mess hall, examining the recruits, until he was once again at the entrance; he smiled, and nodded. "At ease. Now, I have a very, very special treat for you, folks - not only is it simulation day, I even have two highly-decorated representatives of Pilot-Titan School who have deigned to take time out of their busy schedules to run the simulations themselves. Allow me to introduce G262-R18 Pilot Zaeed Massani, and G262-R5 Titan JE-2K174, Jessie."

The Pilot's faceplate hissed as it slid open, revealing a deathly-pale face that was more scars and burns than flesh; Zaeed smiled thinly, and Jessie's faceplate flashed from dark to light blue as they both nodded.

"You bunch are what I have to work with, eh?" Zaeed folded his arms, and sighed. "We'll have to see."

"They've been doing well, Pilot," Sorensen said proudly. "A fine bunch of soldiers, all of them."

"Really."

"Be nice, Zaeed," Jessie warned, prodding Zaeed in the arm with a thick metal finger.

"They don't pay me to be nice," Zaeed rasped.

Jessie's faceplate-light blinked a soft green, and she snorted a laugh. "Actually, part of your contract stipulates-"

"-anyways," Zaeed continued, rolling his eyes, "show of hands. How many of you are SAAF veterans?"

All of the recruits raised their hands, and Zaeed made a sort of huffing noise. "Hrm. Really? Not even a single civilian - hmph. How about - how many of you were special forces?"

This time, about half of the recruits - Jane and KN included - raised their hands.

"Well, we'll see about that. Jessie and I will be watching you lot - bring them to the sim room, Sergeant, and we'll get started." With a curt nod - and a jaunty wave from Jessie - the pair left the barracks, the doors closing behind them.

"Was - holy shit, that was Zaeed," Ashley muttered.

"Yes, it was. Told you bunch I had a surprise for you yesterday. Come on, let's get you folks simmed up." Isaac led the recruits back towards the barracks, past their living quarters, and into a prefab concrete room which bore sixty gunmetal-grey pods, all lined up in a uniform row. Without hesitation and not bothering to wait for orders, Jane, KN and the others all opened the hatches of their assigned pods.

"You ready, Ken?" Jane asked, grinning.

"Was born for this, right? You bet I am," KN replied, flashing solid green with his faceplate-lights. "Let's crush this."

Jane clambered into her pod, lay down and pressed the small button on the armrest which would lower the hatch; she turned her head to the side as the lid slid shut, and flashed a thumbs-up at KN, who returned the gesture. For a moment, the pod was silent and dark, and Jane could hear only her breathing-

-and then the telltale feeling of water being poured into her skull began as the pod's link systems began synchronizing with her neural interface. Jane shuddered as the sensation spread through her body, a thousand points of cold flooding through the air of the pod-

-before the darkness of the simulation pod was gone, and in its place was a massive mountain range which extended as far as the eye could see; sunlight shone through a thin layer of clouds above them, and a light, fresh breeze blew around the assembled group.

"Welcome to the Gauntlet," Zaeed said, a toothy grin spreading across his face. "Now - let's put you lot through your paces. From what Sergeant Sorensen tells me, you might very well be the most talented batch of applicants Pilot-Titan School's gotten in a few decades. Unfortunately, I don't buy it."

"I won't necessarily agree with that," Jessie added, her faceplate's blue light dimming slightly. "It is unusual, yes, that all one-hundred-twenty of you have made it past the testing so far - normally there's been at least a few washouts by now. So - yes, you can be proud of that much - but don't rest on your laurels just yet, alright? The hard part is just about to start."

"One month," Zaeed continued. "Starting from today, you people have one month to perform to standard. That's thirty-one days for you to get used to a simulated versions of the bodies you will be provided as Pilots, or the combat rigs you'd have as Titans. That's thirty-one days to learn how to move, maneuver and fight in a body that's faster in every conceivable way from the hunks of junk you're in now by a factor of a hundred. Thirty-one days, recruits, for you to acclimate to the Pilot-issue jump-kit and operate it the same way you use your dinky booster-packs."

"Now, don't let Zaeed's grumpy exterior fool you," Jessie snorted. "From this point on, basically all of your training is going to take place in sim. You'll have access to the Gauntlet and its associated environments whenever you want to use them - and we're running this sim at one-to-two time dilation, so really it's more like two months to get up to speed."

"Bet you lot are going to need it," Zaeed scoffed. "So - I've skimmed your dossiers. All of you have combat experience. All of you come, ahem, 'highly recommended' by your old superiors. You're going to prove that to me. Let's see if, at the very least, you people can move and shoot like actual goddamn soldiers."

With a snap of his fingers, the mountain range the recruits were standing in shifted slightly; with a pixelated ripple and a short burst of static, the mountain range shifted and reconfigured itself, whole peaks and cliffs rearranging themselves into a winding nest of tunnels and ramps which stood before the group.

"Here we go. A basic killhouse," Zaeed said, nodding as he examined the new addition to the platform the group was standing on. "It's nothing fancy - if you people are half as good as you say you are, this won't be a problem. Everyone clears this killhouse in...let's say, twenty seconds, and then we'll talk. Clear?"

"Clear, Pilot!" the recruits shouted back.

"Good." With a wave of his hand, Zaeed conjured a massive rack of firearms and a second rack of infantry-grade boost-packs, both of which were suspended in mid-air by the entrance to the killhouse; he folded his arms and smiled. "Take your pick, and get to work, recruits. Jessie?"

"I'll be at the other end of the killhouse," Jessie said, nodding. "See you on the other side!" She waved, and winked out of sight.

The group began shuffling forward, lining up at the gun rack and picking weapons; soon, the recruits began running the course, and Jane waited eagerly, the crackling thunk-fwoom of railgun-fire echoing through the open mountainside. Eventually it was her turn; she scanned the simulated weapons available, and picked out a weapon she was more than familiar with - a cut-down, black-grey carbine; once she plucked it off the rack, her HUD lit up with a small readout in the bottom-right corner.

 _Lastimosa Armory R-909RC-SPEC6: Compact Rail Carbine  
60 rds / 0 mag_

She shouldered the weapon, checked the chamber-indicator, set it to semi-automatic, then slung it around her shoulders while she strapped on a booster-pack. Geared up, she waited for her turn in line; KN tapped her on the back when it was her turn to go, and Jane flashed a smirk at him.

"Next," Zaeed grunted. "Jane Shepard, eh? Made a name for yourself running as part of Ground Warfare's SOG - your dossier was a little on the thick side."

"Apologies, Pilot," Jane said, her attention placed squarely on trying to see into the dimly-lit interior of the stone killhouse.

"Whatever. Alright - three, two, one, move!"

Firing her boost-pack, Jane launched herself into the killhouse with her rifle raised, landing with a running start as she turned a corner into a small rock tunnel; four humanoid targets popped up as she rounded the corner, and with practiced focus she popped each one in the head. From there she ran past the targets and up a ramp made out of an angled mountain-face, firing at targets as she ran; she reached the end of the ramp and was faced with a dead end.

Eyes flitting about, Jane quickly spotted a small hole in the ceiling and boosted up the wall as far as her pack would take her, before using the protrusions in the stone walls to scrabble up the the rest of the distance. With one hand still on her rifle, she used the other to pull herself up and into the final stretch of the killhouse; once she was upright, it was a straight line to the finish. With only another six targets popping into view between her and the exit, Jane fired her boost-pack again, flinging herself forward in a low arc, firing as she flew forward; she landed just before the exit and stumbled slightly as she transitioned into a running stop.

Now on the plateau where Jessie and the other recruits were, Jane moved to the side of the exit, clicked her rifle's safety on and walked over to Jessie.

"How'd I do?" Jane asked, slinging her rifle over her shoulder.

Jessie shrugged, her heavy combat rig clanking with the gesture. "Not bad, not bad. Eighteen-point-zero-two seconds." She pointed at a holographic display hanging over the recruits, which was currently updating with Jane's time. "First place, for now. Decently done."

"I - thank you, Titan," Jane said, grinning.

"Don't let it go to your head," Jessie added, her tone chiding. "Go join the others, alright?"

Jane hummed happily as she joined the other recruits; there was considerable chatter as the scoreboard updated with a new set of times.

* * *

 _PAR: 20 SECONDS / ALL TARGETS HIT_

 _TOP FIVE_

 _Jane Shepard: 18.02 - 100%_

 _KN-6D1687: 18.05 - 100%_

 _Lee Riley: 18.18 - 100%_

 _Ashley Williams: 18.22- 100%_

 _KI-8Q4D3X: 18:25 - 100%_

* * *

"Ayy, Ken!" Jane shouted as KN's name appeared on the scoreboard, and turned around to see KN emerge from the killhouse, automatic shotgun cradled in his arms. "Nice work! And a shottie? Since when?"

"Figured I might change things up," Ken replied, stomping over to Jane and high-fiving her. "Look at you! Top of the boards, eh? Show-off."

"Don't listen to KN," Ashley snorted, patting both on the back as she joined them. "He's just jealous that he can't shoot shit like you can."

"I'm totally good at shooting stuff," KN groused. "Just, you know, from several kilometers away. I'd like to see any of you crunch a six-kilometre kill-shot in under five seconds."

"No fair, metalhead," James interjected, as he exited the killhouse. "Not all of us have a head fulla calculators."

"You got augs, James, same as anyone," Jane replied. "Just 'cause you can't count, that's not our problem."

"I can count to twenty, Jane. Good days, I can make it to thirty," James replied, grinning as he took in the score-board; he whistled, and shook his head. "God damn, and I thought nineteen-ten was a good time."

From that point on, the scoreboard's top five did not change; after several minutes, the last recruit passed through the exit, followed by Zaeed - who came barrelling out of the killhouse so quickly that Jane was barely able to track him as he flew straight into a sauntering walk.

"Well, that's all of you," Zaeed shouted, coming to a stop next to Jessie. "Nobody broke seventeen seconds - can't say I'm surprised, but we'll have time to work on this."

There was a quiet ding as the scoreboard updated.

* * *

 _PAR: 20 SECONDS / ALL TARGETS HIT_

 _TOP FIVE_

 _Zaeed Massani: 08:00 - 100%_

 _Jane Shepard: 18.02 - 100%_

 _KN-6D1687: 18.05 - 100%_

 _Lee Riley: 18.18 - 100%_

 _Ashley Williams: 18.30 - 100%_

* * *

"Sweet Christ," Ashley muttered. "Eight seconds? Are you fucking serious?"

"Not even his best," Jessie replied, face-lights greening. "You're getting old, Zaeed! What happened to five-twenty?"

"I'm taking it easy," Zaeed grumbled. "So - all of you made the par time. Good. Any of you hadn't been able to make that, I'd be upset. Just a little. Now, I can see the looks on your faces - some of you think, I bet, that you could do as good as I did with a proper Pilot-grade jump-kit."

Silence.

"So, you know what? I'll give you lot a try. You think you can do better with higher-spec gear, step forward, and I'll modify the parameters of your boost-packs. Any takers?"

A binary in a light combat chassis stepped forward, the fur-strip ponytail attached to the back of his flat, square head bobbing slightly. "I'm in."

"Kai, huh?" Zaeed said, folding his arms. "Alright. Your kit's ready. Knock yourself out, kid."

Unholstering a TriVolt PDW from his rig, Kai angled himself towards the entrance of the killhouse, spread his stance, and launched himself into the killhouse tunnel at just under two hundred kilometres per hour.

KI's scream lasted less than a second before there was a massive clank-thunk which echoed through the mountain range; a few moments later, KI respawned several feet above the air next to Zaeed, and was unceremoniously dumped onto the ground.

"Well done, Kai," Zaeed scoffed. "Nice flying, Recruit."

"I've died in sims before," KI groaned, rubbing his head as he got to his feet, "but I've never turned myself into paste."

"Fun, isn't it?" Jessie said, face brightening. "How d'you feel?"

"Like shit," KI grumbled.

"Point made?" Zaeed asked.

"Yes, Pilot."

"Good. As you can see, folks, there's a reason sim day starts in the sims and not in meatspace," Zaeed continued, pacing back and forth. "The maximum safe operating velocity of your boost-packs, about sixty-five kilometres per hour, is nearing the limit of what your basic augmentations can handle - both physically and mentally. As Recruit KI just demonstrated, this does not translate to you being able to maneuver at two-hundred kilometers per hour, which is on the low end of what my jump-kit can put out."

"Still, you've all proven you're capable of performing to infantry standard," Jessie added. "You all are excellent soldiers. Marines, SOG, counter-terror - these are all excellent ways to measure combat ability in relation to your fellow Ground Warfare elements. Excellent foundations to build upon. But if you lot want to be Pilots, to be Titans - you're going to have to do better."

"And better," Zaeed continued, "means better everything. Better equipment. Better bodies. Better minds. So, today, we're going to give you a little taste of what it's like to be a Pilot or Titan. Not to fight as one, but just to live as one. Breathing. Moving your body. Walking."

Jane watched, glee barely held in check as her HUD lit up:

* * *

 _Pilot-Titan Augmentation Data Set, Training-Basic (Simulated 2.5) Downloading…complete._  
 _Testing neural link...link secure._  
 _Connecting Direct Neural Interface with Simulation Interceptor Data Set….complete._  
 _Unpacking…_

 _Cognitive Accelerators, 50% Output…..OK_

 _Reflex Booster, 50% Output…...OK_

 _Body Augmentation Simulator, Basic….OK_

 _Ready._

* * *

"Here you go, Recruits," Zaeed said, a wide, toothy grin spreading on his face. "Enjoy."

Jane twitched.

 _Everything_ twitched.

It wasn't that time itself had slowed down; everything was still moving as it was before.

The breeze.

Sunlight filtering through motes of dust.

The feeling of her fatigues and her undersuit against her skin.

Her breathing. Her lungs moving, the intake of air, individual body parts contracting and expanding.

It was as though everything in her immediate surroundings was being liquefied and drip-fed into her skull; Jane could feel her eyes almost rocketing around in their sockets as she felt her mind see, examine, analyze and file away the most minute details in her sight and senses.

She blinked - too hard, the first time, slowly on the second. With supreme focus, she managed to move her head; Jane had intended to simply move her head slightly to the right to see KN. What she actually did was whip her head to the side so quickly that she felt like she was going to throw up. Choking back the nausea, she watched as KN - whose chassis had locked up into complete stillness - examined his hands, flexing them open and closed in a slow rhythm.

Eyes flitting about, she watched James punch himself in the face with enough force to send him flying backwards. Saw Kai try to take a step forward, before, his limbs flailing around wildly, he crumpled into the ground face-first. Saw Ashley, laying on her back, eyes closed, twitching slowly.

"How's it feel, recruits?" Zaeed shouted; the words were simultaneously too loud and too quiet, each syllable sliding into Jane's ears like grease. "This is what it's like to be a Pilot or a Titan, recruits. Not zipping around with jetpacks and shooting up the baddies, folks - right now, you're living the real deal. Feels good, doesn't it?"

Someone in the corner of Jane's vision began dry-heaving, a long, low moan escaping from his mouth.

"Okay, that's probably enough, Zaeed," Jessie said, greening her lights. "You have to be nice, remember?"

"I am being nice," Zaeed grumbled. "If I wasn't, I'd have turned this shit up to full strength, thrown them in the deep end."

"Language," Jessie chided.

"Sod off, Jess. We're in a sim full of soldiers, not...I dunno."He waved his hand, and-

-Jane blinked, without trouble, falling to her knees as she panted, doing her best to not curl up into a ball.

"Oh, fuck," KN said, his voice oddly tinny. "How the hell are you guys not all, like, puking your guts out? I feel like I'm gonna hurl, and I don't have a digestive system."

"I - I almost threw up," Ashley groaned, getting back to her feet. "Good lord."

"Congratulations, you all made it through," Jessie said, hands on her hips. "I know that must have been...uncomfortable, but you're going to learn to get used to it, promise. Once you've acclimated, you'll wonder how you lived without a chassis full of augs."

"Damn right, you lot are getting used to this." Zaeed waved his hand, and the mountain range was replaced with a infinite, blank plane of dark blue. "We're going to start slow, and take things easy."

Jane shuddered slightly and watched with unease her as HUD lit up once more.

* * *

 _Pilot-Titan Augmentation Data Set, Training-Starter (Simulated 2.5) Downloading…complete._  
 _Testing neural link...link secure._  
 _Connecting Direct Neural Interface with Simulation Interceptor Data Set….complete._  
 _Unpacking…_

 _Cognitive Accelerators, 5% Output…...….OK_

 _Reflex Booster, 5% Output…..…...OK_

 _Body Augmentation Simulator, Minimal….OK_

 _Ready._

* * *

This time, Jane was able to blink and breathe without feeling like her body was trying to tear itself apart; her body still felt fundamentally wrong, her senses still too vivid her brain hyper-aware of her surroundings.

"Well, well. None of you are throwing up or punching yourselves in the face," Zaeed snorted, "so I think we can call this a minor success so far." He waved his hand, and holographic representations of the recruits winked into existence in front of the group. "Keep in mind, though, that a five percent increase in cognitive processing, or a five percent boost to your reflexes is still more than you're used to. Same goes with the kinetic augmentations."

"What you're going to do," Jessie explained, "is try and mimic the movements of the holograms - they'll keep track of your body and highlight any problem areas. Remember: slow is smooth, and smooth is fast. You're not here to impress Zaeed or I-"

"-that comes later-" Zaeed interjected.

"-you're here to learn," Jessie said, reddening her lights at Zaeed. "So go slow! Take your time. Feel like you're falling off balance? Start from the top. You get the idea. Now - we're going to jack up your neuroplasticity, so don't be worried if you feel, uh, weird."

"Wait, weird?" Jane asked, raising her hand. "I thought neuroplasticity stims were for, like, people getting into new bodies."

"Yes, and if you intend to get into Pilot School, Recruit Shepard, then you're going to be dumped into a new body. Or was that not clear?" Zaeed said, rolling his eyes. "You've all got regen chips - even if they're not nearly as fancy as mine, the work you do now saves you the hassle later." He paused, then smirked. "Assuming, of course, that you people pass my tests."

Jessie nodded, flashing her lights. "All good? All good. Now, common symptoms you might feel when we activate the Artificial Neuroplasticity Stimulation program include synesthesia, mild vertigo and feelings of body-alienation. Nothing to worry about, but if it gets too outta hand, you let me know, okay? Alright, hold on, here we go. And three, two, one-"

"-whoa," Jane yelped as her senses dulled for a moment; the sim environment shifted back and forth, and long, soft pulses of colour crept around the corners of her vision. The previously odorless smell of the testing plane was replaced by a strangely burnt-sugar sort of aroma, and a quiet ringing noise echoed in the back of her head. Looking around slowly, she noticed the other recruits all in similar states of discomfort, though nobody looked to be in pain or the like.

A few minutes passed, and eventually the sensation dimmed slightly - though it didn't recede entirely. Satisfied that everyone was moving around without any serious amount of uneasiness, Zaeed cleared his throat and snapped his fingers as the holograms began walking in place.

"Holograms are on! We start with walking - slowly - and we'll progress from there. One foot forward, then the next, repeat! Begin!"

Jane looked over at KN - who was rolling his shoulders - and they nodded at one another, smiles spreading across their faces as they took their first, cautious steps forward.

* * *

CHECKING CLEARANCE: CIVILIAN. DISPLAYING ENTRY V1  
 **CODEX: THE SYSTEMS ALLIANCE**

The Systems Alliance, or in common parlance, simply the Alliance, is the central governing body of human and binary society. It traces its origins back to before the use of the Freeport Calendar to the Titan Wars, a series of battles between the Core Systems-backed Interstellar Manufacturing Corporation and the Frontier Militia, an irregular, decentralized fighting force composed of colonists. The IMC had previously been sent from the Core System to search for areas to carry out resource extraction and exploitation; the initial excitement slowly waned, and after a series of conflicts in the Core System, the IMC left behind a token group of colonists and left the frontier for several generations. When the conflicts in the Core died down and the Core System could no longer support the wants and needs of its growing population, the IMC returned to the Frontier- and was shocked to find that the colonists they'd left behind had flourished thanks to undisturbed access to the plentiful resources the IMC had found, but never tapped.

The IMC stated that they had total, rightful control of the Frontier systems, both socioeconomic and geopolitical, thanks to their claims dating back to the original colonization period, and proceeded to wrest control of the Frontier back from the colonists, seizing assets and using military force when they deemed it necessary. After several failed attempts at negotiations, the peoples of the Frontier banded together to form the Frontier Militia. This led to a number of skirmishes where several IMC personnel defected; ultimately, these early fights led to a string of minor victories for the Militia, ending in the total expulsion of the IMC from the Freeport System; this is the basis of the Freeport Calendar and the last day of the battle, October 9th, is Freeport Zero.

Ultimately, the conflict between the IMC and Militia would continue for nearly sixty more years; faced with the escalating nature of the conflict, rising costs, discontent at home in the Core Systems and an increasingly competent and organized Militia left the IMC in ruins financially and militarily; the company found itself unable to fulfill their mandate to send resources back to the Core and equally unable to fend off the Militia in any meaningful way. Over the course of the next sixty or so years, the Militia transformed itself into the Frontier Alliance, which would, as the colonists of the Frontier expanded their territory, become the Systems Alliance of today. The Alliance Parliament and the servers for its virtual equivalent, Nexus-Liberty, are hosted on the planet Harmony.

* * *

CHECKING CLEARANCE: CIVILIAN. DISPLAYING ENTRY V1  
 **CODEX: EARTH, SOL & THE CORE SYSTEMS**

The planet which both humans and binaries can trace their origins to is a mere shadow of its former self. Once a planet covered in great forests and shining seas, by the time the IMC set out to reclaim the Frontier from its inhabitants, Earth was a ravaged shell of its former self, having played host to no less than eight planet-spanning wars. Its inhabitants began an ambitious series of terraforming programs meant to nurse the planet back to a healthier state, but the Fold Wars which began in 110 Freeport and ended in 115 Freeport effectively sealed the planet's fate; Earth today is a shattered, broken landmass covered in spatial and temporal anomalies. Despite the danger, many continue to scour the planet, hoping to recover artifact-derived byproducts, relics and other items to be sold for incredible amounts in the markets of the rest of the Alliance. The planet remains mostly uninhabited; its non-native populace is primarily composed of researchers. Earthborn citizens are estimated to number at around 10 million, though the number is assuredly higher; a large portion of that number remain destitute compared to the rest of the Alliance's civilian population despite numerous resettlement efforts. **  
**

Termed "Sol," the other planets inhabiting the same system as Earth have fared little better. Mercury, long having been strip-mined for resources, no longer holds any material value to the Systems Alliance; some binaries and uploaded humans remain on the planet in research facilities, but no civilians remain. Mars, similarly to earth, suffered catastrophic damage during the Fold Wars, and while some military and R &D installations remain on the planet, most of the surface remains deserted. Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto all contain government installations, primarily industrial in nature, with minimal civilian presence.

The closest systems to Earth - Proxima, and Tau Ceti - which make up the "Core Systems" were not spared by the horrors of the Fold War, and remain in a similar state to Sol. Tau Ceti in particular is a minefield of spatial-temporal anomalies which continue to be mapped and cleared by specialists; Proxima has long been abandoned as a viable home for civilians, and nowadays serves as a place for the Systems Alliance to carry out research and testing far from any prying eyes.

The Core carries a strong, painful reminder that the Systems Alliance only has the freedoms it does now thanks to suffering, death and destruction on an unimaginable scale; the blasted worlds and ruinous anomalies which persist to this day in the Core Systems are a reminder of the terrors of Strategic Fold Weaponry. Haunted by the collective memory of its actions, the Systems Alliance works towards peace and stability, hoping to never relive the horrors of their past.


	3. ALLIANCE ARC I-ii: Accelerator

**ALLIANCE ARC I: PROLOGUE** _/ LOADING MTP BROADCAST SYSTEM...COMPLETE. FIFTEEN ROUNDS LEFT IN MAGAZINE. FIRING...SIXTEEN HITS CONFIRMED./_ **  
Part Two: "Accelerator"** _/ INFECTION VECTORS CONFIRMED, TARGETS ONE THROUGH SIXTEEN. VIRAL LOAD: MAXIMUM. STANDBY FOR UPLINK. /_ **  
Pilot School [LOCATION CLASSIFIED]** _/ UPLINK CONFIRMED. INITIATING MTP-BS TRANSMISSION. /_ _Oh, wow, thanks for showing up - excuse me? No shit you guys are "running late," it's been a week! Do you have any idea how fucking boring it is in here?  
Oh, come on, no, that's not gonna fly here. When I got here we were already behind schedule - and with you guys deciding to take your sweet time, now we're nearly two weeks behind schedule. Two weeks! Even if we all bust our asses-  
-oh, shut up. No, seriously, I don't care about - look, stop with the excuses and get to work. When the brass rolls in we'd better have something to show them, or everyone's in deep shit, myself included. Alright?_

"You are special. All of you. This is true, and even I won't deny it if I'm being serious," Zaeed said, pacing back and forth at the front of the simulated classroom. "We've had no washouts so far, and frankly I think - speaking personally - all of you have what it takes to make it as legitimate Pilots or Titans. Today's lesson, however, is learning about one simple truth: just because you're special, that doesn't mean you're indispensable. Remember the oath. Anyone?"

"I serve in the Systems Alliance Armed Forces, in life, unto death, and beyond," KN said, raising a hand.

"Correct. So far all of the simulations we've run through have been...realistic, you might say. They've been designed to test your skills, to see if you're fit for the kind of training Pilots and Titans receive. Now - look, I know all of you have done wave-based sims, failure-based-scenarios, et cetera. The difference is, when you pass that final test, when you join me and Jessie in the ranks of the highest of the elite, you _will_ fail. You _will_ die." Zaeed smiled thinly, gesturing at his chest. "This is my eighteenth body. Jessie's on her fifth. Pilot-Titan School is going to put you through simulations that will push you past your breaking points, and you will be expected to step up. You've seen the vids. Pilots running around with chunks missing in their torsos, going into combat missing an arm, fighting hand-to-hand with their eyes burnt out. Some of that is augmentations. Some of that is tech. Most of it is training. Experience. A thousand hours of simulated horror, so that when the time comes, you succeed in the field, alive or not."

"The thing is," Jessie continued, "even with all that training and all that tech - like Zaeed says, the numbers are not in your favour, recruits. Pilots and Titans are not called in to handle milk runs - we're called in when the SAAF's special operations teams can't handle things, and that means being thrown into situations that are lethal beyond measure and varied beyond your training. Statistically speaking, one human, or one binary, faced with the odds that are arrayed against us, is going to die."

The recruits glanced at one another.

"But, you _aren't_ one human, or one binary. You're not a Pilot, or a Titan. You're a pair. When you've graduated from Pilot-Titan School, you're not one mind - you're two. A Pilot does not complement their Titan. A Titan does not assist their Pilot. You _complete_ one another."

"The neural link," Jane muttered, nodding slowly.

"Show-off," Zaeed snorted. "Still, correct, Recruit Shepard. The neural link is what separates you lot from any of the SAAF's other fancy-ass operators. You people were chosen because, more than anything, it's your personalities that make you good material for us trainers to work with. With enough time in the sims and the tech to help them, I wager most of the Alliance's elite warriors could fire a gun like we do, run a jump-kit like we do, fight like we do. But that's not the point. More than anything, we - I - need recruits who can interface with one another, synchronize thought and body and motion, and in the process, become the fiercest, toughest warriors the Alliance can field."

"What does it feel like?" Ashley asked, her tone inquisitive. "I mean, sure, we've all read about the Pilots and Titans of old. They had neural links too, right? Not as good as what we have nowadays, but, you know, nothing in the history books comments on their perspective, or how it feels to, I dunno, operate two minds as one."

Zaeed snorted. "Let's go with a classic - the Rifle Brigade. Jack Cooper and BT-7274 had a neural link, but to equate it to, say, what Jessie and I have is like comparing a toothpick to an automatic rail-shotgun. Pilot Cooper's link had an equivalent synchro rating - using our current system - of roughly zero-point-eight percent; the link was designed to assist with chassis-control of BT's frame. Not only was that its only function, but it was also a difficult process to reverse. When BT's original runtime got destroyed during the Typhon Incident - and before they found his backup - it took nearly two weeks of repeated, intensive surgery and neural remapping to clear the link out so that Cooper could work with another Titan."

"On the other hand, when Zaeed and I are out of synchro, we're just, well, us," Jessie explained. "But when we interface, we're assisting one another. Chassis control is literally the first lesson - baby steps. As we increase the depth of our link, we stop carrying out discrete roles and start operating the chassis in tandem. Firing solutions. Evasive actions. Shield vectoring. Strategic planning. At one hundred percent, there is no 'Zaeed' and there is no 'Jessie.' We're two minds, processing every detail, every bit of information in parallel, forming one cohesive unit. I can't explain to you how it feels because frankly, Recruit Williams, you have no frame of reference. How can I tell you what it's like to become another being? Not merely haring the mind of another person, but to become the product of two mind, linked?"

"You mentioned percentages," Jane said slowly. "Can - can you go above one hundred percent?"

"No," Zaeed said, his tone sharp - until his face shifted, eyes shining as a smirk wormed its way onto his twisted face. "Yes."

"Uh...care to elaborate?" KN added.

"No."

"It's possible," Jessie replied, her tone cautious. "In fact, a lot of Pilot-Titans will find that, in some situations, pushing past one-hundred-synchro is necessary to survive. But there's a reason we're not going to teach you how to do it - you can't simulate neural linking, let alone combining the mental matrices of two individuals without, ah, irreparable changes. So don't. Alright?"

"Yes, Titan," the recruits echoed back.

"Good." Jessie nodded, folding her arms. "And I mean it. This isn't something you joke around about. I can think of three - four, maybe - cases where Pilot-Titan pairs who did this came out unharmed, or at the very least, unchanged. Another three where the damage was permanent. The last two? Details are classified. That should be enough for you to get the idea -and if you can get the idea, you can do it for real." With a wave of her hand, the classroom sim flickered and faded as it transitioned into an open, grassy field; sixty boxy Titan chassis, each one ramrod-straight with their cockpits open, stood in a loose circle around the group.

"Recruits! The Vanguard Mark Fifty-One, Olympian Variant. Thirty feet and fifty-two-tons of the best the Alliance has to offer in everything from Precursor-derived metamaterial engineering and Ark-Engine construction to the latest improvements on Osiris-pattern armour plating developed in-house by the R&D teams at Horizon Technologies. This is it, recruits. This," Zaeed shouted, gesturing grandly, "is the real deal."

Jessie looked at him, yellowing her lights.

Zaeed sighed, and rolled his eyes. "Okay, well, the real deal, simulated. Each of you pair up with your partner - all of you _have_ picked one like I told you to a few days ago, I hope - and pick a chassis. The AR systems will walk you through the proper ingress procedure - once you're all suited up, we'll continue with today's lesson."

Jane clapped a hand on KN's back, grinning.

"Oh, greetings, good Binary sir. I'm Jane Shepard and I find myself in need of one good metal gentleman who can assist me with matters Titan-related," Jane said, feigning a swoon. "Might you be the very one for me?"

KN snorted, and greened his lights. "Milady," he said, his synthesized voice adopting an upper-crust accent, "please allow me to escort your most esteemed personage to one such vehicle."

The pair marched off to one of the Vanguard chassis in the distance, more or less at the same time as all of the other recruits; they'd all settled on partners long before Zaeed had asked them to, in any case. As Jane and KN got close to their chosen chassis, a series of holographic prompts began to pop into view all around and on the chassis itself, noting that Jane would have to climb up the machine's arm to get into the cockpit, while KN's chassis would be stowed in a compartment on the Titan chassis' underbelly.

"Well, here goes," KN muttered as he walked between the chassis' legs; he reached up and jumped slightly, grabbing onto a set of handholds which stuck out slightly of the Titan chassis - and was, with a muted yelp, pulled out of view into the chassis' interior. Jane followed suit, running up the machine's arm and clambering into the dimly-lit interior of the Titan; the cockpit was cramped, but not uncomfortably so, consisting of a tall, smooth metal seat lined with dozens of cable ports, a set of backup physical controls and control-sticks mounted around the arms of the chair, and various racks for Jane's gear. Buttons and switches marked with various AR codes and symbols lined every surface of the upper sections of the spherical cockpit, and Jane took a deep breath of virtual air as she beheld the small space before her.

At last, she'd made it.

Simulated or not, she'd arrived, finally, at the dream. The end-goal. The finish line. What every grunt in the Systems Alliance Armed Forces aspired to be.

"Hey, uh, you gonna stand there all day?"

Jane jumped and hissed through her teeth as her head slammed into the overhead panel of the cockpit, while KN's laughter reverberated through the tight space.

"Man, I was having a moment," Jane grumbled, rubbing at her head. "Way to ruin it."

"No fun allowed, right? Come on, sit down, let's get booted up," KN replied.

"How's it in there, anyway? Nice and roomy? What's it feel like with the chassis deactivated?" Jane asked as she lowered herself into the seat.

"Weird as hell," KN muttered. "Like…I dunno how to explain it. Tingly. Maybe it's like when your limbs fall asleep? And everything just feels, uh, spacious? I guess?"

"That's wildly undescriptive," Jane snorted as several holographic prompts flickered into view. "Instructions for administrative startup," Jane read, eyes flitting back and forth as she took in the diagrams and instructions floating in front of her. "Step one, wait for Binary Partner Control Unit to activate, and check via audio or signal confirmation. That means you, KN?"

"You know of any other metalheads plugged into this thing besides me?" KN asked.

"No need to get snippy with me. Just reading the instructions," Jane grumbled. "Step two, ensure proper seating posture and activate automated crash netting by hitting one of the manual activation-release switches on the seat shoulders." She looked over her shoulders and located the bright orange plastic button. "Alright, here it goes."

She hit the button carefully, and yelped when, suddenly, flexible grey arms shot out from the seat and grabbed her legs, torso and helmet, forming crash restraints in less than a fourth of a second. Jane exhaled heavily, and tried to move in the seat; there was some resistance, but the restraints allowed her to move.

"Okay. Step three, shut cockpit with hatch control lever on right wall panel, or ask Binary Partner Control Unit to set Chassis Control Function Value 'hatch_angle_value' to zero."

"Got it for you," KN said, voice going slightly tinny for a moment. "And...there."

The hatch hissed softly as it swung shut, leaving Jane sealed within the Titan's darkened interior; a few moments later, several glow-strips lit up, illuminating the various switches and panels with a dim, pale-blue glow.

"Step four, release Ark Reactor safety switches one, two and three, on left side of ceiling panel," Jane read, flicking a series of red switches above her head, "then spin up Ark Reactor using large diamond button, or ask Binary Partner Control Unit to set Chassis Ark Reactor Control Function Value 'ark_reactor_online' to true." With an ever-widening grin, Jane pushed the button marked "ARK REACTOR," and did her best not to shout with joy as a whining screech rumbled through the chassis - and the interior of the chassis came to life in a flurry of blinking lights and various chiming noises.

"Whoa, whoa, holy shit," KN shouted.

"You okay? What's going on?" Jane asked, patting the cockpit's walls. "You alright?"

"Uh, yeah, just - man, this is so fucking weird," KN muttered. "Like...I feel, uh, enormous, all of a sudden."

"You know what they say about a man who brags about his size," Jane chuckled. "Step five, await post-reactor checklist, check error indicators on overhead panel and ensure no fault warnings except 'TITAN AI LOG' are visible at this time…and that's all green."

"Fuck off, I'm serious! Like - like my center of balance is way off, or something," KN rumbled. "Okay, uh, step six, initialize primary control functions via Control Function Panel, or ask Binary Partner Control Unit to set Chassis Sensory Uplink function 'csu_primary' to one hundred percen-"

"KN?" Jane looked around the cockpit as the various control-sticks on her armrests wiggled around, and frowned. "KN? You there?"

Another moment passed in silence, when suddenly the interior of the cockpit vanished, seemingly turning transparent; Jane was left sitting in what felt like a bubble, suspended between the arms and legs of the Titan's chassis with a clear view of her panels, instruments, and the simulated environment around her."

"TITAN ONLINE," KN shouted. "Oh, man, you would not believe how badass this is. I'm a stompy war-machine, Jane! I'm a real man now! How's it for you?"

"I'm sitting in a Titan," Jane replied, grinning from ear-to-ear. "That's pretty cool, I guess."

"Way to undersell it. Last step, enable Neural Link parameter and set to zero point five percent. You ready, Jane?"

"Been ready my whole life. You wanna do the honours?" Jane asked.

"Hell yes. Uh, first, uh, you gotta lean back in the chair," KN explained.

"Done."

"Sure. Okay...let's see. Control parameter 'NLink," deactivating safety, activating terminal network, yes, yes, final control warning windows, checkmark - parameter value, zero-point-five, searching for Local Pilot Signal...okay. Here we go," KN rumbled, the barest amount of hesitation creeping into his voice. "Aaand-"

Jane hissed as her vision flashed with bright lines of white and green; her HUD, which was simulating the output of a Pilot Suit, began spitting out a torrent of diagnostic checks in the top-right corner of her view.

* * *

 _Pilot-Titan Neural Link: Initiating_  
 _Link Synchronicity, Target Value: 0.5%... configuring… DONE_  
 _Neural Network Connectors...ONLINE - GOOD HANDSHAKE - GOOD PING [2ms]_  
 _Pilot Support Systems… ONLINE_  
 _Variable Neural Remapping...ONLINE - Seeding Metacortex network 40e^9 Nodes_

 _Stand by…_  
 _Prefrontal Cortex Input, GOOD FEEDS, GOOD PING - READY_  
 _Visual Cortex Interface, GOOD FEEDS, GOOD PING - READY_  
 _Motor Cortex Bindings, GOOD FEEDS, GOOD PING - READY_  
 _Cerebral Cortex Secondary Function System, GOOD FEEDS, GOOD PING - READY_

 _[CLASSIFIED], READY_  
 _[CLASSIFIED], ONLINE_

 _Secondary Parameter Value Check: OKAY_  
 _Tertiary Parameter Value Check: OKAY_  
 _Final Functions System Check: GREEN ONE_  
 _Link Synchronicity, Target Value: 0.5%_

 _Synchronicity & Neural Drift: Minimal / Within Standard Deviation (+/- 3.14...e-290)_  
 _Releasing Bandwidth throttle set_var: FirstSync_  
 _Neural Link: ONLINE_

* * *

 _Expansion._ There was no other way to describe it.

 _[Uh, hi there. Wow. This, uh, huh. This is...strange. Man, organic neural networks are fucking weird. There's so much stuff in here.]_

The voice was KN's, but it wasn't coming from the speakers within the cockpit. In fact, it didn't seem to be coming from anywhere in particular; Jane could only imagine it as there being a small, three-hundred-sixty degree speaker planted within the middle of her head.

"KN, uh...you're in my head," Jane whispered.

 _[Whoa. Nope, don't do that, please. That's fucking bizarre.]_

"What do you mean?"

 _[That! Don't - don't do that! Like, talking aloud - I'm - I'm hearing that both in your thoughts, my cockpit pick-ups, and the Comlink. With lag, too! Seriously, it's weirding me out. Just try… speaking without speaking? Thinking aloud?]_

 _[Okay,]_ Jane thought. _[How about this?]_ There was a strange feeling, as if her mental speech was buzzing, or tingling as she "spoke" into the expanse of an empty space that extended beyond her head.

 _[Yeah - yeah, that's way better,]_ KN replied. _[Okay. Uh. So. We're sharing headspace? Can you, like, see into my programming?]_

 _[Nope. I - I can feel you in my head, I think, and there's, like, this...this void space in my head, like I want to be able to move another limb or something, but can't. Maybe that's you?]_

 _[Maybe? Uh, I dunno,]_ KN said, sounding as though he were confused. _[Why don't you try moving some of the controls?]_

Jane nodded to herself and placed her hands on the gyroscopic control-sticks; she pushed the right one slightly forward, and yelped in surprise as a massive red holo-window popped into view, accompanied by a loud, blaring error noise.

 **CONTROLS LOCKED BY SIM INSTRUCTOR**

"Whoa there, looks like we have a winner," came Zaeed's voice; Jane peered at the space in the centre of the sim-environment where Zaeed and Jessie were still standing, and flinched as her entire focus shifted to a slightly more zoomed-in perspective. Zaeed was standing with his arms folded, shaking his now-helmeted head. "No moving yet, you two. Hold still, stay quiet and wait."

"Uh, sure," Jane replied out loud.

 _[I don't think he can hear you from in here,]_ KN snorted. _[Hold on. Uh...let's see...speakers? External speakers? Yup, here we go. Okay, try that again.]_

"Okay, we'll stay still," Jane said; this time, Zaeed nodded and flashed the chassis a thumbs-up.

"Good work, KN - rooting through the functions already. Keep at it. Everyone else, double-time!"

 _[So,]_ Jane thought, _[I gotta say, not being able to talk out loud to communicate with you is kind of annoying.]_

[Hey, you're not the one that has to deal with hearing two Janes talking at once,]

KN replied. _[Maybe there's a function for that too? Actually, why can't you dig through the functions with me?]_

 _[I dunno. Probably another sim-locked function,]_ Jane mused.

 _[So...we just sit here. In our twenty-five foot mountain of guns and rockets and shit. Doing nothing.]_

 _[Well Zaeed did say you're allowed to poke around in the functions list,]_ Jane scoffed down the link to KN on the other side of her expanded mindspace. _[I'm the one who has to sit here and do jack shit.]_

 _[Not my fault you're the meatbag here. You could have uploaded, become a digital like Joker. Your loss.]_

 _[Hey, people wanna cuddle, I've got that nice, soft, warm meat on my bones.]_

 _[Nice try. My chassis is heated.]_

 _[Still not soft.]_

[That's 'cause I'm a soldier, Jane. Got no time for cuddling. I'm built for war and I'm all business,]

KN said proudly. _[Also, you know, I'm a twenty-five foot walking, talking, gunslinging death machine.]_

 _[Not yet you aren't,]_ Jane chided. _[Simulated, more like.]_

 _[Hey, fuck you too, buddy. Simulated Pilot! Hah, now what?]_

 _[I'm not the one bragging.]_

 _[I - yeah, okay, I've got nothing.]_

Another minute or so passed before, at last, the other chassis around the simulated field all switched from kneeling to standing; moments later, Zaeed and Jessie both flickered out of view, and in their place there now stood a forty-foot Titan chassis; compared to the Vanguard model KN and Jane were currently in, this one was more rounded and stood with a more squat posture.

"Recruits," came Zaeed's voice from the external speakers of his chassis, "today, you take your first steps together as Pilot and Titan. With your synchros at point-five percent, you can move with nothing more than a thought. At maximum synchro, you will react and make decisions within the chaos of combat faster than any one human or binary ever could. But not today. Today, we're starting with just walking, running, jumping. The basics of movement."

"The goal," Jessie added, "is that." Her chassis pointed a thick finger at a space in the distance; there, the grassy field split apart and opened into a seemingly bottomless chasm, the far side connected to the field via a precarious sequence of floating platforms, steep inclines and sheer drops. Hundreds of small, floating spheres began to float at various speeds between the obstacles, and a second group of walls and platforms flickered into the zone - these ones far too small to fit a Titan chassis.

 _[Oh, shit. That's an obstacle course, isn't it,]_ KN groaned.

"That, recruits, is an obstacle course," Zaeed shouted. "Welcome to the Gauntlet, Type Seventy. You're looking at your final exam. The Gauntlet will challenge your skills to their very limits - and if you can't score the par time of one minute, you don't get into Pilot-Titan School. Simple as that. Hard as that."

"To clarify," Jessie continued, "the Gauntlet began as a way to test a Pilot's ability to move and shoot at high speeds. As it turns out, there's more to operating under battlefield conditions than being able to go fast and hit your targets. So - the Gauntlet, Type Seventy, tests more than that - you'll be operating the Titan chassis and the jump-kit under extreme conditions, working in tandem to fire at mobile targets, yes. But you will also be working while the Pilot is on and out of the chassis. You will be activating switches that require the Titan and Pilot to be in two different spots. You will be firing at targets which react and move differently based on whether the Titan is in close proximity to the Pilot. You will be dodging incoming fire while doing all of this. You will be avoiding environmental hazards. You will be pushed, and the only way to make it through will be to work as a team."

"Twenty-six days. That's how long you have to practice," Zaeed finished, as the chassis he was in shrugged. "You have access to the sims whenever you want - Jessie and I are here to assist you lot with the basics, like how to move and walk and shoot without falling over. Everything else, that's up to you. We will not be helping you figure out the Gauntlet. That is up to you, recruits, and you only. Keep in mind, this isn't a competition. Pilot-Titan School does not have a quota or a limited number of spots for training. Work smart. Work together. Work hard. Is that clear?"

"Yes, Pilot!" came the reply.

"Good. Very good. Now - I'm going to release the system locks on your machines," Zaeed explained. "Now, you have hand controls and foot pedals, right? Forget those. They are a last resort for when everything advanced goes down. As a Pilot, you don't think about moving your body - instead, think about moving the chassis' body. That sounds unclear, but listen to me - you can do it! In combination with judicious use of mental commands, saccades and HUDspace manipulation, you will all be to achieve a level of granular control that is simply impossible using something as clumsy as a pair of physical hands."

Jessie let out an audible snort. "But we're not going that deep today - so don't let Zaeed scare you. Now - to walk the chassis, all you folk have to do is think about walking, inside that space beyond your usual mind, the 'metacortex'. Think of it as shared brainspace for controlling the Titan. That's the easy part. The key to proper - good - Titan control is symbiotic thinking. You let your partner handle what he's good at, you do what you are good at, and you think together where neither is strong or both are equal - and you do not think in each other's way. Anyone of you ever played the game where you get tied to someone else's leg and have to race? It's not really all that different - the more in synergy you are with your partner, the more easily you move. The less in synergy you are, well...I'm sure we'll see."

"And here we go. Systems controls are unlocked," Zaeed said, "in three, two, one."

Jane flinched as something in her mind clicked; suddenly, the empty void in her mind filled with warmth and feedback - like a heated doorway into an endless space of tangled corridors.

She was Jane Shepard, sitting inside the Titan - and she was the Titan, beyond her body and inside her mind at the same time.

 _[Whoa, hey! I - is that you?]_ KN asked, his voice a mix of surprise and shock.

 _[Uh, maybe? Are you the weird glowing...thing in my head?]_

 _[Who're you calling weird? You should see your headspace - full of meat and shit. Yeesh.]_

 _[Well that's rude,]_ Jane thought with a mental scowl.

 _[You're the one who star - oh, man, that's fucking strange. Uh...I keep feeling pulses of...chest organ movement commands?]_

 _[I think that's my breathing.]_

 _[Breathing is weird,]_ KN grumbled. _[How do you deal with that? You can't delegate that to a passive runtime, so...do you, like, always think about breathing on some level?]_

 _[No - I mean, now that you've mentioned it, yeah, but normally it's unconscious. You know that.]_

 _[You can't fault me for being curious. Like - like knowing that breathing is unconscious and feeling the air intake and output commands is way different.]_

 _[Sure. You wanna try walking or not?]_

 _[Uh, here goes.]_

Jane willed _her_ right Titan foot to move forward.

KN fired a right-leg movement impulse to _his_ right Titan leg.

 _Together_ , they took a slow, uneasy step.

And then another. Another. Another.

 _[Haha, shit, look at us! We're walking!]_ KN shouted gleefully - and Jane felt him, agreed with him.

They weren't the only ones now; all across the field, the Vanguard chassis were taking tentative, thudding footsteps, stomping slowly across the grass in random directions. Jessie and Zaeed watched, their chassis standing with arms folded , for several minutes - before Zaeed sighed loud enough for everyone to hear.

"Come on, look at you lot! Waddling around like a bunch of crippled animals - run! Jump! Try something new! I'm going to die of boredom watching you louts tiptoe around all day!"

Jane and KN turned their heads to the side and watched as one of the chassis to their right managed three bounding strides before slamming face-first into the ground.

"Ow," came Kai's voice from the downed machine. "Uh...I think Hal and I are stuck," he grumbled, as the Titan's legs and arms flailed about uselessly. "Fuck me, how do you even get up? Are Titans even supposed to go prone?"

In response, Jessie and Zaeed's machine jumped into the air and landed, seemingly without effort, on its hands and pointed feet, before beginning to do push-ups at a ridiculous speed.

"Yes, Kai," Jessie replied. "You can get up without help - think! How would you do it if you fell down in your infantry chassis? Hal, if you fell down, how would you get yourself back into a standing position? Think it, and you can do it!"

"In fact, we'll all do that," Zaeed added as his chassis flopped into the field's grass with a resounding thud. "Everyone - on your bellies! Nobody leaves until we all get up off the ground."

The recruits did as they were ordered - and began the arduous process of attempting to maneuver their chassis into a standing position once again. Long minutes passed as the field was filled with the grinding, thumping noises of their failures; it took eight minutes of effort (and Zaeed's increasingly frustrated shouting) until, at last, Lee Riley and her partner, SN-0201EE140, managed the feat.

"Incredible! Well done, Lee, Susan, it only took you eight goddamn minutes to get on your feet," Zaeed grumbled. "The two of you - get back on your stomachs, and this time I want to see it done in four minutes or less. Everyone else - get at it. And if you have tips, share them!"

"You gotta really want to get up," Lee said, laughing.

"Fuck you too, Lee," Ashley ground out from her spot on the ground.

"Uh, legit though, start with your knees," SN added. "Like - like you gotta tuck your knees under you, then push up, and go from there. It's easier than trying to use your arms to push up first, I think."

Jane and KN were the next ones to make it upright just before the ten minute mark; by the time all of the recruits were up, nearly half an hour had passed. All of them now stood at attention, and Zaeed's chassis shook its head.

"Thirty minutes. That's not going to fly, and you people know it. Now - we practice getting up, again, until all of you can do it as easily as you fall over. Get to it!"


	4. ALLIANCE ARC I-iii: Graduation

**ALLIANCE ARC I: PROLOGUE** _Ah, yes, welcome, Director. My apologies for the mess - no, no, of course not. Yes. Of course. Yes, Director. I trust that our work is up to standard?_  
 **PART THREE: "Graduation"** _Thank you. We've worked hard to ensure that everyone is up to speed. The recruits will be finishing their testing shortly, if you'd like to oversee the infection process._  
 **Pilot School [LOCATION CLASSIFIED]** _I think - won't that be risky, ma'am? I know they can't technically see you-_  
 **November 9th, 460 Freeport** _-I understand. We'll prep a shuttle for you right away._  
 _Y-you're sure? Well, if - if you'll allow me to speak candidly - I'm not sure the last batch of workers were trained very well. I know we're stretched thin, even with the new sources, but still - if you could speak with the Training and OR departments-_  
 _\- thank you, Director. That means a lot to me, ma'am. Anyways, the shuttle is here, if you'll just come this way..._

"This is it, recruits. When I was standing where you are now, I felt a lot of things. Fear was not one of them. Apprehension was not one of them. Remember: you cannot fail, not really. All of you passed the psych evals. All of you passed the written test. Fuck's sakes, all of you've already cleared the Gauntlet under par. Really, the worst I can do to you is say, try again next year," Zaeed shouted as he paced around on-foot in front of the assembled recruits and their sim pods. "So don't be afraid. Don't worry. Don't think. Act. All of you have been in combat before. Treat this like a firefight, and you'll do just fine...even if you do fuck up."

"Now, you've all done this countless times, but just to be sure - the rules, once more," Jessie added, greening her lights. "The timer starts once either partner touches the chassis. The chaingun mounted to the Vanguard has two hundred rounds, and the R-909RC inside the cockpit's weapon rack has one mag. That's double the amount of ammo you need to hit every target - so if you run out, that's not a good sign. Every target you miss, that's two seconds added to the timer. Par is one minute. Questions?"

"NO, TITAN!"

"Good. I know all of you can do this. All of you have done this before. So get out there and show me and Zaeed what you can do!"

Zaeed looked around one last time, making eye contact with every team standing in line. "Alright, everyone ready? Get in your pods, and get ready to move."

Jane fist-bumped KN before jumping into her pod, breathing deeply as she shut the hatch and let the neural link reach full power; where once the sensation resembled freezing slush being poured into her skull, Jane now barely noticed the slight tingling in the back of her head. She blinked as the darkened pod was replaced by the simulated field environment she'd spent countless hours in over the past few weeks; she was standing in front of the Gauntlet, and a Vanguard chassis was kneeling before her. A small holoboard hung in the air next to the chassis, displaying a leaderboard.

* * *

 _PAR: 60 SECONDS / 5 MISSED TARGETS / 50% SYNCHRO MINIMUM  
TOP FIVE  
ZAEED & JE: 31 SECONDS / 0 MISSED TARGETS / 100%  
LEE & SN: 48 SECONDS / 1 MISSED TARGET / 52%  
JANE & KN: 50 SECONDS / 0 MISSED TARGETS / 87%  
ASHLEY & DI: 52 SECONDS / 2 MISSED TARGETS / 62%  
HAL & KI: 56 SECONDS / 1 MISSED TARGET / 44%_

* * *

Jane cleared her mind, and grinned as KN flickered into view next to her.

"So. Real talk," KN said, greening his lights. "We ran this in fifty seconds. Think we can do better?"

"Don't see why not," Jane replied, shrugging. "I mean - like - let's not push this, but if we can do better than fifty I think we ought to try?"

"Sounds good to me. How deep into neural we wanna go with? I was thinking we run at eighty to start and ramp higher as we go," KN said thoughtfully, one hand tapping the bottom of his boxy head. "

"Eighty-five?"

"Can you handle that much synchro for the whole run and run your simulated augs at a hundred percent for the entire run?"

"Did it last time, didn't I?"

"Yeah, and then you were, like, throwing up and dry heaving for six hours after that," KN rumbled. "And I still needed, like, twenty minutes of decompression."

"Well we're not getting marked on whether or not we're sick after," Jane pointed out. "Besides - if Zaeed and Jessie can run full-throttle all day, there's no way we can't do the same."

"I suppose. Well," KN muttered, "let's do this."

Both walked up to the chassis, careful to make sure their limbs and clothes were well away from its massive frame; KN took his place beneath the chassis' legs, and Jane made ready to jump up onto the Titan's arm and into the open cockpit.

"Okay. On three," Jane breathed. "One. Two. THREE!"

A thousand hours of time-dilated, simulated practice turned into fluid, unconscious motion; KN jumped up and into the belly of the chassis, and by the time Jane had settled into the cockpit KN had already begun the boot procedure, the hatch sealing shut behind her. The reactor howled to life as Jane activated the crash netting and flicked all of the switches on the panel marked "Control Function & Chassis Sensory Uplink," and she readied herself for the oncoming shock that would come next.

"Here we go," came KN's voice. "Uplink, eighty-five percent, online-"

Jane, KN and the chassis all rumbled with shock as their minds crashed, then flowed into one another - and before the wave of jumbled sensations had faded, they were sprinting towards the first jump into the Gauntlet at maximum speed, chaingun tracking and firing at targets with perfect, easy accuracy.  
 _  
[Three targets left side two-six-zero.]  
[Firing.]  
[Jump, incoming, point-five seconds, boosters half power, direction seven-five.]  
[Roll left.]  
[Seven targets, aim up, track, left to right.]  
[Jump, incoming, point-six seconds, boosters full power, direction two-six.]  
[Jump, incoming, point-oh-nine, drop into roll.]  
[Uplink at eighty-seven percent.]_

The Titan tore through the Gauntlet at a full sprint, leaping and vaulting over obstacles as it ran, dodging and weaving through the clouds of simulated projectiles pouring in from every angle. Soon they arrived at a split path - on the left, the massive, flat platforms continued on, while the right side bore a patchwork of tiny, interconnected walls and surfaces.

 _[Eject me, max speed, top hatch as you run by upcoming point, one second.]  
[Ejecting.]_

Jane hissed through her teeth as the neural link abruptly shut off; still reeling from the sudden lack of connectivity, she grabbed the rifle attached to the overhead weapons rack as she was fired out of the top of the Titan chassis. Firing her jump kit at full power, Jane flung herself through the air towards the nearest surface, adjusted using the kit's microthrusters and angled slightly so that she could slide across the wall. As she impacted the wall and began a mag-boosted slide, she shouldered her rifle with one hand and began firing at the plethora of targets which were floating in slow circles around her section of the course. Split-seconds later her patch of wall ended, and Jane fired herself at the next patch of surface - this one a section of wall whose only grippable surface would place her upside-down - and ran, her simulated-augmented legs turning into a blur as, upside-down, she aimed and fired at target after target - until, within view, the two paths of the Gauntlet intersected once again. Jane fired herself off the upside-down platform, slapping a tiny lever as she passed it, and sailed through the air at nearly two-hundred kilometres per hour.

Still sprinting and firing his chaingun with his left arm, KN caught Jane with the outstretched right hand of the chassis and smoothly slammed Jane into the open front entrance of the chassis' cockpit; simulated inertial dampeners and shock-resistant armours kept Jane from being turned into simulated paste, but even so the impact was enough to cause her to black out for a moment-

-before her vision was wrenched open again by the Titan's neural link.

 _[Re-establishing neural link, output eighty-seven percent - good?]  
[Y-yeah, good, all good! Go, go, go!]_

The last stretch was a nearly straight run to the finish - but the targets and incoming fire were moving so quickly now that the one clearly-defined spheres that were their targets were little more than blue-white blurs.

They were moving fast. Too fast.

By Jane's best estimate, the last thirty targets they had to hit were moving at least seven or eight times as fast as they had during their training; together they did their best to track the targets, but the muzzle of their chaingun always lagged behind the targets, never quite lining up for a clear shot.

 _[Shit, shit, I can't - I can't track them!]  
[Boost the link.]  
[Boosting, boosting - we're at ninety percent-]_

Jane - KN - the chassis - still couldn't track their targets.

They were approaching the end of the course.

 _[Fuck it. One hundred. One hundred! Do it!]  
[Here we go-]_

And then **they** ran, the world around them slowing to a crawl.

It was so easy, **they** thought.

Point. Adjust. Shoot. Run.

Every action flowed into the other.

No Jane. No KN. No chassis.

One mind and one body tore past the finish line just as the last target popped apart.

They stopped, panting, their frame shaking with the stress, their chaingun wavering with the blowback of their exertion as the holo in front of them updated.

* * *

 _PAR: 60 SECONDS / 5 MISSED TARGETS / 50% SYNCHRO MINIMUM  
FINAL SCORE: JANE & KN: 39 SECONDS / 0 MISSED TARGETS / 100%  
_ ** _PASS_** _  
STAND BY FOR EJECT_

* * *

Jane hadn't eaten that morning, and so instead of throwing up in the darkness of her sim pod, she instead began dry-heaving with so much force that her chest felt like it was about to explode.

"Easy, easy, easy," came Jessie's voice. "Easy, you're okay. Breathe, just focus on breathing, okay? You're alright."

"Outstanding, recruit," Zaeed said from out of view. "Out-fucking-standing."

"P-p-pass?" Jane managed in between heaving, laboured breathing.

"You're goddamn right," Zaeed replied, his scarred, burnt face looming over hers as a cracked, lopsided grin spread across his face. "Welcome home, Cadet Pilot Shepard."

* * *

CHECKING CLEARANCE: CIVILIAN. DISPLAYING ENTRY V1  
 **CODEX: The Systems Alliance (Governance)**

With hundreds of planets in multiple systems, each of varying size and of wildly different import to the Alliance's socioeconomic well-being, the central governance carried out by the Alliance Parliament has always been a difficult issue. The transition from Frontier Militia to Systems Alliance was not a perfect, easy process; several of the individual sections of the Militia refused to join the Alliance post-war, though by 100 FP all had conceded some level of authority to the centralized government without any armed conflict. (Many critics have noted that in certain cases, despite the lack of overt military force, the Alliance of old was not afraid to use the threat of economic sanction and trade blockades to get what they wanted; this practice has stopped and reparations have been made in an attempt to apologize for said actions.) Today, Alliance Parliament is hosted on the planet Harmony, the economic and political centre of the Systems Alliance; planetary representatives are required to spend at least 3/4s of the standard year in their own constituency to prevent disconnection and a promotion of power in the Parliament itself. Thanks to the seeding of most of Alliance space with Quantum Entanglement Communication Buoys, virtual attendance (whether via sim-representation, holo-presence, or in case of extreme distance, text communication) is a commonplace occurrence.

Alliance Parliament also has a virtually accessible form called the Nexus, a series of hosted servers at key points in Alliance-controlled space; the largest and most well-known is Nexus Liberty, also hosted on Harmony. Thanks to time-dilation technology being far more effective with binaries, and through the use of QECBs, the Nexus' binary attendees are, in theory, able to debate, if not resolve, issues at far faster rates than humans could ever achieve, then synchronize the results via QECB. Most Nexus servers are constantly operating; most also have set hours for humans to participate or listen to proceedings, with the time-dilation turned down to 2:1 sim-realtime. In practice, the Alliance Parliament and the Nexus work very closely together; Nexus Liberty has, with only a few exceptions made in times of crisis, never gone beyond the 2.5 to 1 time dilation limit that the average dataport-equipped citizen can handle.

* * *

CHECKING CLEARANCE: CIVILIAN. DISPLAYING ENTRY V1  
 **CODEX: Binaries**

True "smart" artificial intelligences with the ability to adapt, evolve and emote as strongly as any organic being began to come into their own around 25FP; several AIs, many of them purpose-built as Titan AIs for the Frontier Militia, began to show more organic traits ranging from improved decision making to the expressing of favoured weapons and learning to emote. The IMC, at the time, generally looked down upon this sort of behavior; AI in the IMC, as well as simulacra (digitized human minds, or possibly AIs programmed to copy human minds; recently declassified IMC documents from the time period provide contradictory information) were poorly treated and routinely abused or reprogrammed. The Frontier Militia, on the other hand, almost unanimously accepted their new compatriots with open arms; this is perhaps unsurprising, as the majority of early "smart" AI within the Militia were Titans already linked to Pilots, or AIs built for tactical planning which worked closely with humans on a regular basis. As the war with the IMC wound down and after the chaos of the Fold Wars, AIs became increasingly commonplace amongst the social order of the Frontier; many AIs, military or otherwise, began to take tentative steps to further integrate themselves into society. By 100FP, AIs in physical chassis were a common sight on any well populated planet; by 200FP, AIs found themselves throughout society and nearly fully integrated into organic life.

Most AI citizens of the Alliance dislike the terms of "robot" and "simulacrum," believing them to place undue emphasis on the othering of synthetic identity; the commonly accepted term is "binary," coined during the Synthetic Integration Conference of 150 FP, where well over 250 billion AI convened on the Nexus Liberty server, hosted on the Alliance capital-world of Harmony. The full transcript of the conference has been published in sixty-eight volumes and covers things ranging from a proper name for binaries (as mentioned above), to what binary citizens should do when organics are eating, to even things such as how to handle human-binary romance. (While never explicitly illegal, Human-Binary marriage / union rights were not enshrined until 180 FP.)

As time and technology have marched on, the lines between Binary and Human have become increasingly blurred. With near-universal installation of nano-scale high-speed dataports at birth, as well as Regeneration Chip implantation a year after birth, functionally speaking all humans within the Alliance are capable of being "uploaded" into a Binary-like form commonly referred to as a "digital." Combined with the ever-increasing ease of consciousness transfer between platforms both organic and mechanical (commonly referred to as "resleeving"), R&D experts believe that the line between Binary and Human might very well fade into obsolescence within the next few centuries.


	5. CITADEL ARC I-i: RESCUE

**CITADEL ARC I: RESCUE** _Some of you have questions. Worried about ethics. Worried about morality. Good sign. Not questioning outcomes a sign of burnout, of losing compassion._  
 **Batarian Anomalous Zone (Formerly Harsa System)** _Loss of compassion dangerous in this line of work. Never forget the why. Never forget why we act. Our duty - our goal - is too important to dismiss the individual element. Cruelty, if inflicted, is a side-effect._  
 **9th of Skies, 2378 Galactic Standard / 1895 Council Era** _Every person who suffers from our actions is a victim. Not to be discarded. Not to be forgotten. Not to be pushed to the side. Never forget that._  
 _But that cannot stop you. People will suffer. Unavoidable consequence of our duties. Two ways to sleep at night: make peace, or give in to burnout. Give in to easy option. Give in to indifference._  
 _Do not let second option tempt you. Please._

"Thrusters, check. Navigation, check. Internal emissions sink online. All systems nominal. Drift, one-five-zero-k. All stations, report in."

"Nicely done, Valtha," Nihlus noted, grinning. "How's the new ship treating you?"

"Fine, very fine. He's smooth, Nihlus," the asari pilot replied, leaning back in her chair and looking up at the turian Spectre. "Thought the _Lightspear Apex_ would be clunky and harder to maneuver - it's, like, three times as heavy, wide as shit, et cetera - but honestly this thing flies smoother than the original ever did."

"Don't let Raetor hear you," Nihlus replied, chuckling. "I think he's still pissed that he didn't get to oversee the design process."

"Poor bastard's always pissed about something," Valtha snorted. "I think it's an engineer thing. So - we just hanging out here?"

"For now. I need to debrief Larix and my ground team - let's not go spooking anyone who's still hanging around here quite yet."

"You got it, boss."

Nihlus turned around and exited the cockpit of the Lightspear Apex, passed by the rows of communications and cyberwarfare operators seated in the sunken pits which flanked the walkway to the bridge, and made his way into the Operations Centre of the ship - a massive holotable, around which sat dozens of personnel. Standing at the command platform was another turian - this one dressed in a Turian Navy Captain's uniform, surveying the system map below him with a critical eye.

"Nihlus," the captain said, waving him over. "Valtha like the new ship?"

"She called it smoother than the original, Larix," Nihlus replied, joining Larix on the command platform. "Also said not to let Raetor hear that."

"Too late. Someone's overheard it," Larix replied with a smirk, "and that means it's going to get to him somehow."

"Shame."

"Well, we're in-system now - mind filling me in as to why we're here?"

"We need to extract a high-value target," Nihlus explained. "Batarian woman by the name of Bekhamis Sae'feth. She was working a deep-cover op, feeding information on slaver movements after the Hegemony's collapse to my contacts - and then she sent a distress call yesterday before going dark."

"Spirits. You think - you think slavers got to her?" Larix asked, expression darkening.

"Could be. Could also be some old Hegemony state-sec agents with a grudge. Or some of the Batarian Survival folks might have rounded her up, thinking she's actually a slave-trader. Who knows?" Nihlus shrugged with a weary look. "Intel from the BAZ's been a crapshoot since the Collapse. Hard to say what happened. In any case, all Bekhamis managed to transmit were a set of coordinates - she's being held on a patchwork station orbiting what's left of Khar'shan." Nihlus gestured to the system map, and rumbled uneasily. "I don't like it either - there'll be dark energy anomalies lining the approach vector, and all that debris from destroyed planet is going to make it ambush central if we're dealing with hostiles."

"Let me guess. You're going in hot?" Larix muttered.

"Well, ideally, no," Nihlus replied, folding his arms. "Don't say it - I'm fully aware that things have a tendency to get dicey when I'm involved."

"Look, if it was you running this ship, pulling your ass out of hot exfils every other day, you'd be skeptical too," Larix mused with a small snort. "So - we get you and your team in, you grab Bekhamis, and then we pick up your infil shuttle. Easy?"

"Easy," Nihlus echoed, smirking. "Just like any other day at the office."

Larix sighed, and rubbed at his fringe. "Spirits, man, one day our luck - your luck - is going to run out and we're all going to die in some nightmarish shitstorm thanks to you."

"Captain Quentis," Nihlus whispered with mock horror, "surely you don't believe in anything as base as luck."

"Oh, piss off. Go get your team of merry madmen and get off my ship," Larix rumbled, pointing a talon at the elevator behind him.

"Can't order a Spectre around, Larix. I'm in charge," Nihlus replied, patting Larix on the shoulder. "Technically, this is my ship." With a jaunty wave, Nihlus walked over to the primary elevator, and keyed a series of commands into his omnitool as he descended to the bottom deck.

Moments later, the wall-mounted comms chimed with an alert, and a smooth, synthesized recreation of a turian woman's voice echoed through the entire ship.

"MARCA to all personnel, be advised. The _Lightspear Apex_ is entering a potentially hostile zone. Condition two. Repeat, condition two. Priority mission alert from Spectre Kryik: Fireteam One to shuttle bay. Orders from Captain Quentis: Engineering, prepare to disengage phase shift and stand by to maximize matter-conversion reactor output. Gunnery, stand by on all hardpoints. Shuttle bay, prepare Verux One for launch. System alert: all AI subroutines shifting to combat mode. Minor terminal lag expected for the next three seconds...complete. Systems nominal. MARCA out."

Another chime marked the end of the message just as the elevator came to a stop, and the doors slid open to reveal the ship's shuttle bay crew scrambling to complete their flight checks on one of the slim, dagger-like shuttles which was nestled in the hangar's leftmost launch cradle. The bay's armoury was also online, and an attendant was busy pulling three gear racks out of the large, boxy locker-station nestled in the wall.

A salarian who was helping the attendant lay the gear racks out turned as the elevator doors opened and waved at Nihlus; his left eye was prosthetic, and visible seams from numerous augmentation surgeries were visible on his face, arms and legs.

"Bossman! We gonna go pull Bekha's ass outta the fire?" the salarian asked, clasping arms once Nihlus approached.

"Damn straight, Itok," Nihlus replied, grinning.

"I hope it's slavers. Haven't shot me a slaver in months," Itok said, nodding eagerly. "Where's Rae?"

"I was going to ask you that, actually," Nihlus answered, frowning as he turned to the turian attendant. "No offense, Lieutenant Aedilia, but I don't like gearing up without Raetor checking things over."

"None taken, Spectre Kryik," the woman replied with a crisp salute. "Man's a spirits-damned wizard when it comes to gear checks. Racks are open - if I'm not needed here, I'd like to go help out the flight crews."

"Of course. Dismissed," Nihlus said, nodding; Lieutenant Aedilia jogged away towards the shuttle, and Nihlus returned his attention to Itok. "Legit, though, where is he?"

"Fuck if I know," Itok muttered as he pulled various pieces of armour off his gear rack and onto a nearby bench. "MARCA," he said into his omnitool, "where the shit is Raetor?"

"Raetor'Taame nar Xawal is currently in the process of advising the Engineering personnel on matters related to the correct disengagement of the Phase Shift Device," the AI replied from his omnitool.

"Well tell him to...not do that, and to get his ass over here," Itok grumbled. "He's late."

"Understood. One moment," MARCA noted; when the AI spoke again, its voice came over the shipwide comms. "MARCA to Raetor'Taame, your presence is required immediately in the shuttle bay. MARCA out."

"Advising," Nihlus rumbled as he pulled a well-worn rifle off his rack. "Giving them shit, I bet."

"Engineers," Itok scoffed as he strapped himself into his armour. "Assholes, all of them."

"Aren't you an engineer?"

"Didn't say I wasn't an asshole, boss."

"Yeah, uh, most people take that as an insult."

"I like to keep my reputation garbage," Itok replied, grinning as his armour began sealing over his body with a series of audible clacks. "That way, when I'm not shit, people are pleasantly surprised."

"Sorry I'm late," a hoodie-clad quarian shouted as he ran out of one of the auxiliary elevators. "Had to give the engineering team some shit."

"Fuckin' told you," Itok snorted. "Rae! Come on, get suited up - we're on a schedule!"

"Ah, fuck - I'll be quick, Nihlus," Raetor said, clasping arms with Nihlus before scurrying over to his gear rack. "What's our intel like on this station?"

"We've got none," Nihlus replied sourly. "Shanty-station, built after the Collapse fucked up the the system. MARCA can pull scans for us once we're in range, but I guarantee it's gonna be a spirits-damned maze of tunnels and corridors and whatnot. So - gear up for lots of close quarters fighting, because it's gonna be nasty."

"I hate shanty-stations," Raetor grumbled as he threw off his hoodie and began strapping on his armour. "It's all, you know, shotguns and omni-blades. Very stressful."

"Hey, at least your drone-swarm won't get shot to bits from lack of cover," Nihlus pointed out as he locked his helmet to his belt and holstered several firearms to his armour. "Actually, with MARCA's boosted processing you could probably tie up - or knock out - the entire station with the damn things."

"Heh, why don't we just broadcast over an open channel?" Itok mused. "Hi there, probably-slavers, we've got a couple dozen pounds of AI-controlled mini-drones that can turn a krogan into a walking steak, how about you throw your guns down?"

"So...we're not doing negotiating?" Raetor asked as he finished gearing up. "What if, like, they take Bekhamis hostage?"

"Fuck'em," Itok growled.

"Hey, easy, buddy," Nihlus chided. "The goal is to not get everyone killed."

"Slavers aren't people," Itok spat.

"We don't even know if they are slavers," Raetor pointed out as he sealed his helmet's mirrored faceplate. "If you end up pumping a bunch of civilians full of holes, I'm not writing your AAR for you, Itok."

Itok shrugged as he put his helmet on. "Spectre's touch, Rae. Don't gotta write shit."

"You may not, but I have to write reports to the Council," Nihlus pointed out as he, too, donned his helmet and shut the visor. "So, you know, if you can avoid ventilating civilians or whatever, I'd really appreciate that."

In unison, the three slammed their gear racks shut and walked over to the waiting shuttle; it was already humming as its engines cycled into standby, and the side hatch was open and waiting.

"All prepped," said one of the turian engineers. "We're ready to go on your command, Spectre Kryik."

"Thank you," Nihlus said, nodding as he, Itok and Raetor boarded the shuttle; the hatch sealed behind them, and the cramped interior's strip-lights illuminated the shuttle's passenger bay with a pale blue light.

"Just waiting for an approach vector from the MARCA," an armoured turian woman said as she leaned around the pilot's chair and waved.

"Got it, Ultina."

"Things gonna be hot?"

"Ideally not," Nihlus rumbled.

"Okay, so yes. Got it," Ultina snorted.

"Verux One," came MARCA's voice. "Approach vector complete. Lightspear Apex is now on approach. Stand by for anomaly map and target station scan."

"Understood, MARCA," Ultina said aloud. "And - oh, oh, fun. This is going to be great."

"Whassamatter?" Itok asked.

"I don't know," Ultina grumbled. "Maybe it's the damn minefield of anomalies out there? Or the fact that the station is, I don't know, possibly the most shoddily-built thing I've ever seen? I have no idea where it's going to be safe to breach into - I can't even tell what's supposed to be an airlock or not."

"Just find us a nice, small room to get into," Nihlus said, rubbing at his helmet, "then you bug out until we find Bekhamis. Easy?"

"No."

"Can you do it?"

"Yup."

"Okay. That's all I need," Nihlus sighed.

"MARCA to all personnel, be advised," the AI broadcast. "Hostiles confirmed; scans of shanty-station show electronic signatures consistent with 'Sons of Khar'shan,' Classification One Slave-Trading group. Engineering, disengage phase shift on signal one. Gunnery, open hardpoints on signal one. Condition one. Repeat, all personnel, condition one. Verux One, stand by to launch on confirmation of signal one and launch-bay airlock cycle."

"Fuck yeah," Itok said, unholstering his shotgun. "Let's go shoot us some baddies."

Nihlus joined Ultina in the cockpit of the shuttle as it was fired out of the Lightspear Apex's airlock, stomach dropping as the shattered ruins of Khar'shan came into view. He'd seen footage of the system post-Collapse, but the up-close sight of an entire planet reduced into a field of slightly-glowing rubble in person scratched uneasily at the back of his mind. Even so, remnants of Batarian society clung desperately to the shattered husk of their former homeworld, and as the shuttle continued its approach several dozen shanty-stations appeared: small, ramshackle constructions held together with spit and the desperate hope that Batarian society might rebuild.

"Alright, approach vector is good - anomaly fields are bad, but we've got a clear path," Ultina muttered, as much to herself as to Nihlus. "ETA, about two minutes. Let's see - nice spot on the far side of the station with a ton of breach points. I'll bring you as close as I can."

"Sounds good - we'll get ready to jump," NIhlus said, nodding. He returned to the passenger bay, where Itok and Raetor had pulled a tall, thin rectangular metal plate off the rear storage rack; both were hunched over it, omnitools flickering as they worked. "One-way plate?"

"Yeah. Normally I'd go with the cluster charges or just, you know, getting the shuttle to bust a hole open," Itok grunted as he pulled a series of large safety-tab off the plate's surface, "but Rae pointed out that we might get Bekha in the crossfire, or space her."

"Speaking of - we need a change of clothes for her," Raetor pointed out.

"I've got a hostie suit in my rig," Nihlus replied. "Hurry it up with that plate - got about a minute 'til we jump."

"Rae, your side good?" Itok asked, getting to his feet.

"Yeah, all good," the quarian replied, pulling the plate upright as he stood up. "Ultina, which side?"

"Left side doors - doors opening in forty seconds," Ultina shouted back from the cockpit. "Ready up!"

"Sync up," NIhlus ordered; he and Itok both leaned over slightly so that their helmets touched Raetor's. "Green."

"Green," Itok and Raetor answered; both hoisted the plate beneath their left arms, weapons at the ready.

"Hatch," Ultina shouted, as the left hatch of the shuttle slid open; the hum of the shuttle's engines were replaced by the soft silence of vacuum, and the ramshackle station that was their target filled their vision. "Jump in fifteen….ten...five...go!"

With a running start, all three launched themselves off the shuttle, their jump-jets firing as they leapt into space. Microthrusters mounted around their armoured hardsuits sent the group into a controlled deceleration that left them holding onto the faded scrap-metal exterior of the station. Without hesitation, Itok and Raetor gently placed the breaching plate onto the station's surface, then shifted themselves so that Nihlus hung "upside-down" at the top of the plate, while Itok and Raetor both took a bottom corner.

Nihlus raised a hand and counted down.

 _Three. Two. One._

The second he made a fist with his left hand, Raetor's omnitool flared to life. A series of tiny charges detonated with a soft whump which reverberated through the station's surface, blowing a small hole the width of one of Nihlus' talons in the very centre of the plate. A split-second later, a boxy compartment mounted on Raetor's shoulder opened, and a swarm of sparkling microdrones poured through the whole - followed by a second explosion which widened the hole enough for the three to launch themselves through. They landed in what appeared to be a mess hall of some sort with their guns raised, scanning the room; it was nearly empty, save for a pair of unarmoured batarians who were both on the floor, twitching as the drone-swarm kept them down with a barrage of electric shocks.

The breaching-plate's onboard omniforge sealed the hole behind them with a thin, airtight layer of sealing-foam, and the three fanned out, checking around the mess hall's counters and in the storage cabinets, before scurrying over to the downed batarians. Nihlus' omnitool lit up as he sprayed their limbs with a healthy amount of fabcrete, leaving the unconscious pair stuck to the floor.

"Scanned 'em," Itok muttered. "Let's see - just two random Batarian civvies? No outstanding warrants."

"Should we leave'em?" Raetor asked, shotgun trained on the mess hall's doors. "Not that I think they'll be getting up anytime soon."

"MARCA said slaver sigs," Nihlus mused. "Still might be civs living here."

"We can't tag'n'bag the whole station," Itok pointed out.

Nihlus shrugged. "Then we leave them. MARCA, Rae, anything on their omnis?"

Itok and Nihlus both trained their weapons on the hatch as Raetor turned his attention to the pair's omnitools; he cocked his head, and nodded a moment later. "Got a detailed station map. Looks like there are slavers here, but they have their own section of the station - we're on the wrong side. MARCA?"

"Preliminary scanning of onboard documents complete," the AI noted. "Most civilians unhappy with slavery presence, but tolerate them for fear of threatening stable operations of the station. I recommend requesting civilian cooperation, then eliminating slavers. Incapacitate uncooperative civilians where possible."

"Alright," Nihlus sighed. "MARCA, peel some drones off - I want updates on movement around our position, civ or not."

"Understood," MARCA replied, as a small cloud of drones disappeared into a nearby vent. "Warning," the AI added a few seconds later. "Seven civilians, armed with makeshift melee weapons, are surrounding the mess hall doors. They appear nervous. Recommend you open friendly negotiations."

"Into cover," Nihlus ordered; the group took cover behind the main serving counter of the mess hall. "Rae, door. Itok, stay quiet, let me talk."

"Never get to negotiate," Itok grumbled.

"Door - open," Raetor said, tapping his omnitool; from a drone-feed in his HUD Nihlus watched as the batarians - haggard, thin, and dressed in clothes which looked like they'd seen better centuries - nervously crept into the mess hall.

"Oh, Gods," one of them shouted, pointing at the pair Nihlus had stuck to the floor. "Kotin! Serek! What in the hells happened to you two?"

"They're okay," Nihlus said, standing up from cover; he kept his rifle in a low-ready, and unsealed the faceplate on his helmet. "Easy, easy, I'm not here to hurt you," he rumbled, as the batarians all raised their weapons - power tools, wrenches, metal poles - and took steps backwards.

"Who the fuck are you?" the man at the front of the group shouted. "What'd you do to them?"

"I'm a Spectre. Here to deal with those slavers you've got at the other end of the station," Nihlus explained, tone calm. "Those two - you said their names were Kotin and Serek? - they're alive, just unconscious. I've got a reagent that'll clear up that fabcrete in a few minutes, and after that they'll be up in a few hours as though nothing had happened to them."

"Slave- you're here to help us?" the leader asked, eyes narrowing. "I don't believe it. Since when does the Council send its assassins to help batarians?"

"I've got a friend who went missing on this station, and I need to get her to safety," NIhlus replied. "If those slavers stop being a problem along the way, I'm not going to lose sleep over it."

For a long moment, nobody said anything,

"Drop your guns. All of them. Put'em into one of the food trays, and then slide them over to us. Then, when I say, you come here and you free Kotin and Serek. Then - maybe - we'll talk."

 _[You sure this is a good idea, boss?]_ Itok asked over comms.

 _[It's fine,]_ Nihlus replied. _[You guys just stay down there. Any of them try something, I can take'em.]_

"You got it," he said aloud. "I'm going to put my rifle into the tray first. Then I'm going to take my shotgun off my back, and then my pistol from my hip." With deliberately slow movements, Nihlus complied with the demand and slid the weapon-laden tray off the counter and over to the batarians. With his hands raised, Nihlus slowly made his way over to the two unconscious batarians, then sprayed down the fabcrete with a small amount of solvent.

"Okay. Okay - so - so take this from the top," the leader said, his tone and posture easing slightly. "Who're you here for?"

"Bekhamis Sa-"

"-ae'feth?" the leader half-shouted. "You know Bekha?"

"Yes, I do," Nihlus answered. "Is that a good thing?"

"I - does she prefer - what's her favourite brand of beer?"

"She doesn't drink beer," Nihlus answered. "Shard wine - Hanas is her preferred brand - taken cold enough to put frost on the bottle."

The civilians exchanged long, uneasy glances - before the leader sighed and rubbed at his face.

"You can put the weapons down, guys - thank the Gods. Look - I'm - I'm sorry about all the trouble - things have just been rough lately," the man said, closing his eyes for a second. "Really rough."

"I can imagine."

"Karos Samad," the man continued, offering both of his hands to Nihlus, palms-up; Nihlus put his hands, palms down, on top of his, eliciting a thin smile from Karos. "I - thank you. Hegemony - caste - or not, I appreciate the gesture."

"No problem. Nihlus Kryik, Council Spectre," Nihlus replied, nodding. "Itok! Raetor! You can come up now."

"You had two guys as backup," Karos said, laughing weakly. "Fat lot of good taking your guns away would have been. You can take them back, not that I could have stopped you."

"No offense, Karos, but I could have taken all of you on," Nihlus snorted as he retrieved his weapons. "Look - what's going on here? I'm not going to lie, I wasn't sent to fix your slaver problem, but now that I'm here I'll be happy to help."

"Well - well, uh, this place, uh, we call it The Respite; a bunch of folks, mostly ex-slaves and low-castes, built it a while back. Things were going alright, 'til those Sons of Khar'shan assholes showed up on our doorstep," Karos explained with a scowl. "They 'asked' for part of the station to use as their home base, since, you know, the planet got slagged, and were so kind as to say that they'd leave us alone, so long as we minded our own business."

"Lemme guess - that didn't work out so good?" Itok spat.

"Nope. Last couple of weeks, they've started asking for 'taxes' from us - supplies and whatnot," Karos muttered. "Something's up - they've been sending guys to and from the station. Ships coming and going, every day. We've been doing our best to figure out what's going on - and try to get out of this - but, well, they have the guns, and we'd barely been able to scrounge up a few antique pistols. That was until two days ago - that's when the bastards rolled through our end of the station and took all of our guns, 'for our own protection,' and said we ought to be grateful that they didn't take more."

"And Bekhamis - she's been living with you guys on-station?" Nihlus asked.

"Yeah. They came in last night, said she'd been spying on them, or something, then dragged her off to their turf," Karos finished, shaking his head. "I - we - we just wanted somewhere to live. Rebuild. No more castes or slavers or - look. I don't have anything to pay you with, and I'm not asking for a ride. Just - make an example of those scumbags, will you?"

"It'll be my pleasure," Nihlus replied gravely. "Get your people away from their end of the station, keep your heads down, and this'll be over in no time. Promise."

With Itok and Raetor flanking him, Nihlus began making his way through the halls of Respite, shotgun at low-ready and his focus split between a trio of drone-feeds piped into his HUD by MARCA, and the small trickle of civilians who - after getting word from Karos - were busy scurrying as far away as possible from the slaver's side of the station.

"Be advised," MARCA noted. "Drone feed three, transitioning to hostile territory reconnaissance."

"MARCA, proximity alert for hostiles. Into cover," Nihlus grunted; he slid behind a nearby bulkhead, followed by Itok and Raetor, and the three turned their attention on their HUDs. The microdrone they were tracking slid through a series of ventilation panels and exited into what might as well have been an entirely new station; in place of the slapped-together mix of panels and compartments they'd seen so far, the Sons of Kar'shan had turned their base of operations into well-maintained and uniformly reinforced station, complete with turrets, klixen mines and even self-sealing airlocks. MARCA updated the map of the station as the drone flew through the slavers' territory, marking hostiles, possible armouries, safe-rooms, vaults and barracks - until, at last, it arrived in a prison smack-dab in the centre of the maze-like map.

There, a pair of thickly-armoured batarians stood in front of a dozen filthy holding cells which each bore a horrifying canvas of stains; most of the cells were empty, save for an emaciated quarian man who laid unmoving in the rightmost cell, and a battered, bloodied batarian woman in the cell on the far left who was glaring at the guards.

"Target identified. Bekhamis Sae'feth, priority target," MARCA said. "Vital signs poor, but stable. Recommend immediate extraction. Second individual – quarian, unknown. Deceased."

"Three dozen hostiles, heavily armed, plus traps," Itok mused. "But Bekha's not dead – not yet – so she's gotta be important, or know something important."

"That comes later," Nihlus said, shaking his head. "Short of us going for a little spacewalk, I don't think we're going to be sneaking onto their turf. Rae?"

"One second," the quarian replied. "Uh, Ultina says the earliest she can be back without tripping their sensors is, like, six minutes."

"Could risk it," Itok pointed out.

"With my luck? Not happening," Nihlus sighed. "There's only one entrance into the holding cells. I'm thinking we drone-swarm the prison, keep the guards down, maybe see if we can't jam the door for a bit. Then we shoot our way there, throw Bekha in the hostie suit and dump her out the nearest airlock so Ultina can pick her up."

"We're not going with?" Raetor replied quizzically.

"Promised Karos I'd take care of the slaver problem," Nihlus said matter-of-factly. "Once we're through, I tell them to surrender."

"Why bother?" Itok grumbled. "They're slavers. Should pull a Saren - space'em 'til they run outta air."

"I'm not Saren, you know that. Due process," Nihlus replied, shrugging. "They surrender, we throw them in prison. If not, they die."

"I don't think that's how due process works," Raetor offered.

"I'm a Spectre. Due process is whatever I say it is," Nihlus snorted. "MARCA, hot infil routes to holding cells."

The group's HUDs lit up as the Lightspear Apex's AI drew up four possible routes leading from their current position to the prison where Bekhamis was being held.

"Routes displayed. Four options available, listed from slowest and safest option, to riskiest and fastest," MARCA explained.

"Four," Itok said.

"Two," Raetor said.

"Three," Nihlus said.

They looked at one another.

"Three it is." Nihlus consulted his omnitool and flicked through a few mental commands before raising a secure channel; moments later, he got a hit.

"Spectre Kryik? Is that you?" Karos asked.

"It is. We're about to go loud," Nihlus explained. "Any of your people unaccounted for, tell them to haul ass."

"They're all safe, Spectre," Karos replied, voice only a little shaky. "We've barricaded ourselves a few rows forward from the mess hall."

"Good. Stay there, don't come out until you hear an all-clear."

"And what if we – okay. Okay, I got it. And – and thanks."

Once the comm icon winked out, Nihlus brought the tactical map up to fill a quarter of his HUD, eyes flitting about as he took in the route, the marked rooms, the tagged hostiles.

"Route."

"Some heavy ordnance in the armoury," Itok said, inching towards a professional tone. "Should trap them."

"Reave mines," Raetor continued. "Barracks after the armory – we move quick enough, could catch a few off-guard."

Nihlus patted one of the compartments on his chest rig. "Stasis-warp grenade if they're unarmed, magma if they are – just chuck it in and move on. Anything else?"

Nobody said anything.

"Alright. Comms only. Forward, and stack on the hatch."

The group scurried forward to the end of the civilians' side of the station; a silver hatch emblazoned with a stylized batarian skull marked the edge of friendly territory.

 _[In position,]_ Itok and Raetor said as they took up positions on the right side of the hatch.  
 _  
[In position. Itok, blue-hot. MARCA, stand by for patch-in,]_ Nihlus subvocalized as Itok pulled a thick, matte-blue bundle off his belt; with practiced ease the salarian placed the bundle onto the centre of the hatch, slapped it and stepped back as the bundle unrolled into a cross pattern, each corner bearing a glowing crimson pyramid.

 _[Breach ready. On your go,]_ Itok murmured, nodding as he readied his shotgun.

"Hostile speaker systems compromised," MARCA said. "Patch-in ready."

"Sons of Kar'shan," Nihlus said, his tone flat and neutral. "This is Spectre Nihlus Kryik. Surrender your weapons, lay on the floor and put your hands on your heads. Comply, you get a fair trial. Resist, I shoot. This is your only warning."

From his HUD, Nihlus watched as the half-dozen slavers on the other side of the hatch clicked the safeties off their shotguns.

He sighed.

 _[Do it.]_

Itok clicked the fingers of his left hand together.

The strips of the cross flashed with a soft-blue pulse, sending shockwaves of biotic warp-force into the hatch. Just as the hatch was beginning to cave in upon itself, the pyramids filled the corridors with a deafening screech before glowing neon-red, disintegrating as they sprayed a torrent of shrapnel into the room beyond. Even as the shrapnel was still flying forward, Raetor overcharged the group's shields, and together the three of them fired their jump-jets forward, carrying them in a staggered line straight through the disintegrating hatch with shotguns raised and firing. The room's turrets and traps were mostly cleared out by the solid wall of shrapnel, the remainder falling quickly to salvos of aimed fire from the three's shotguns; the slavers fared no better, crumpling to the ground. Four died before they hit the deck, and the final two – screaming as they fell – were finished off with a pair of headshots from Raetor and Itok.

"Clear, up!"

"Clear, up!"

"Clear, up!"

Nihlus breathed in.

Breathed out.

"MARCA, cell drones hot! Move, move!"

With Nihlus taking point, the group began clearing their way through the slavers' territory, their weapons barking out a steady rhythm as they suppressed and killed targets as they came into view; as they passed through the armoury, Raetor unclipped several slim mines from his belt before tossing them throughout the room. They continued onwards, encountering only one more slaver – who, despite attempting to ambush Raetor as he passed by a storage locker, was felled quickly by a quick jab to the throat from the quarian's omniblade. Less than a minute later, they came upon the open doors of the slavers' barracks; a quick scan of the drone-feeds showed a dozen half-dressed slavers hidden beneath bunks and taking cover behind dressers. Without hesitation Nihlus primed and threw a belt of grenades into the room without even bothering to unclip them; they exploded as they sailed into the room, belching a thick, searing blast of sticky flames. With shotgun and omniblade, Nihlus shot the flaming figures who escaped from the room, and the group moved one once another check showed nobody standing.

"Stack up," Nihlus shouted as they reached the entrance to the cell doors; the guards within were being held in place by the drone-swarm's barrage of electrical shocks, and when the group entered the room both were dead in a split-second. Bekhamis, for her part, was sitting with one leg over the other, eyes narrowed with interest at the sight of the blood-stained and armoured crew; the ragged robes she was wearing were caked with nearly as much blood as her face, and despite her attempts to remain composed her attempts to hide her shaking, twitching movements were to no avail.

"Hullo there," the batarian woman croaked, closing her eyes. "Friendly?"

"Raetor, door," Nihlus barked as the quarian ran forward, omnitool already lit. "Bekhamis, it's Nihlus – Spectre Kryik. We're here to get you out."

"Oh," Bekhamis replied distantly. "That's...nice. Been rough."

Raetor stepped back as the door clicked open; Bekhamis managed get to her feet and took two steps before falling onto the wall of the cell, arms shaking as she did her best to keep herself upright.

"Hey, you're fine, we've got you," Nihlus said, holstering his shotgun and running forward to support her.

"Warning. Vital signs poor and dropping," MARCA noted in Nihlus' comms. "Multiple fractures, minor internal bleeding, blunt head trauma detected."

"How in the hells are you even standing?" Raetor blurted.

"Pissed off," Bekhamis managed through heavy breathing, eyes half-open as Nihlus helped her out of the cell.. "So godsdamned angry."

"Here – just – hold on," Nihlus muttered. "Itok, help! Rae, watch the door!"

"Got it." Itok moved forward and supported Bekhamis' weight while Nihlus pulled a long, vacuum-sealed bag with a thick cylinder attached to it out of his backpack compartment; his omnitool flared as he ran a hand over it, the bag unsealing and unrolling in one smooth motion.

"Spacesuit," Nihlus grunted as he lifted the suit up. "We're getting you off-station - Itok, help her in."

"Off - what - what about the others?" Bekhamis muttered.

"He's fine. MARCA, external speakers, hostiles remaining," Nihlus said aloud.

"Five hostiles remaining," the AI said calmly. "Two hostiles, barracks, third-degree burns. Death likely within two minutes. Two hostiles, control room, surrendered, awaiting hostile extraction. One hostile, armoury, suffering neural reave. Pain-induced unconsciousness likely within thirty seconds. Correction: now unconscious. "

"N-no," Bekhamis stammered as Itok and Nihlus eased her into the suit. "More. More slavers. Coming back."

Nihlus' head snapped up to meet Bekhamis' gaze. "When?"

"Not - not today. Soon. Protect - have to keep - keep them safe," Bekhamis whispered.

"We will. I will. Promise. Just relax," Nihlus said, patting her shoulder as the suit rolled up over her head and sealed itself. "Bekha?"

"Vital signs poor," MARCA noted. "Priority target is asleep. Recommend immediate medical attention."

Nihlus winced, and hoisted Bekhamis over his shoulder. "Spirits. Okay - Rae, patch Ultina in."

"Already done, boss." Raetor nodded.

"Fireteam, this is Verux One," came Ultina's voice over comms. "Go ahead."

"Ultina, we got our hostage and we need you to get her to medbay ASAP. We're going to drop her out of airlock two-six-one; can you pull an extract?"

"Hot?"

"Cold. Hostiles are down," Nihlus explained.

"Understood. Coming in, ETA one minute."

Without a word Nihlus and his crew made for the marked airlock - less than thirty seconds of jogging away from the prison - and cycled it; the doors opened as the trio's boots mag-clamped onto the ground, and together they watched as the shuttle descended from "above" the station, coming to a halt right by the airlock. The side hatch opened, revealing Ultina standing by with a medical pod, and with slow, considered caution Nihlus eased Bekhamis' fully-suited form through zero-g to Ultina, who slid the limp body into the pod. Ultina tapped the floor of the shuttle twice before closing the hatch, and as the shuttle took off the crew re-cycled the airlock and took cover by the door.

"MARCA, status," Nihlus said, calming slightly.

"Hostiles previously marked as suffering from burns are deceased. Both hostiles marked as surrendered remain in their previous position. Neural-reaved hostile remains unconscious. "

"Okay," Nihlus said, exhaling slowly. "That wasn't so bad. Let's go bag our sleeping friend and then pay our new prisoners a visit. I've got questions."

"You go on ahead and grab the guys in the control room," Raetor said, nodding. "I'll go bag the guy in the armoury and make sure everything in there's secure."

"Thanks, Rae. Come on, Itok," Nihlus replied.

Once Raetor peeled off from the group, Itok and Nihlus jogged towards the station's control room as MARCA called out the various traps and mines the AI's drones had deactivated, tagging them for retrieval later. They arrived to find the two slavers - both batarian men - who'd surrendered laying on the floor in the middle of the room, their weapons placed by the door and all of the command centre's various terminals and holoscreens deactivated.

"Both of you, stay still," Nihlus barked as Itok drew his shotgun and aimed it in the direction of their new prisoners. "I'm going to restrain both of you. Stay still, stay quiet, and you'll be fine. Clear?"

"Clear," the pair said, their voices muffled as they spoke into the metal deck.

"Good." Drawing a pair of thick, reinforced bioelectric restraints from his chest rig, Nihlus quickly clamped the batarian pair's arms behind their backs, checked to ensure they were secure, and backed up to join Itok, drawing his shotgun and holding it at a low-ready stance. "Alright, both of you can get up."

The prisoners complied, shuffling around until they were both seated; both looked at one another uneasily before looking up at Nihlus as he unsealed his faceplate.

"We'll start with names," Nihlus said, his tone calm and cool. "Full names."

"Katha Romhal," the man on the left said.

"Ghasin Famwar," added the man on the right.

"Names check out," Itok muttered. "Minor criminals. Outstanding warrants, but no kill-orders or anything."

"Alright. Well," Nihlus continued, squatting so that his eyes met the prisoners', "Katha, Ghasin, thank you for surrendering. Answer my questions truthfully, and you'll make it out of all this alive."

"Really?" Ghasin snorted. "Heard the screaming from down the hall."

"And the smell," Katha added, wincing.

"I gave my word," Nihlus offered, shrugging. " You surrendered. That means you get a fair trial and the luxury of not being cooked alive. Of course, if you'd prefer the altern-"

"-that's fine, man, we're good," Ghasin interjected. "Anything you want. Ask away, Spectre."

Nihlus smiled thinly. "Question one. Your buddies - the ones who're off-station - they're coming back. When, and how many?

"It's - it's a regular thing. The, uh, our contacts, they come around every five days," Ghasin explained. "They're scheduled to be here in two days, though sometimes they're a day early, a day late. Usually they call in first if they'll be ahead or behind schedule. And, uh, numbers-wise, we're talking, like, a subcompact frigate, fifty guys or less."

"Your crew's been funneling what the salvage-haulers who live here have been finding to these off-station crew," Nihlus pressed. "Why? There's got to be a reason why you're based here and giving resources to people who have more range, more freedom to get around."

A long pause.

"You, uh, you promise? To keep us safe, yeah?" Katha sputtered.

"I'm bringing you back to the Citadel for processing. From there, it's up to C-Sec, and you guys, to take care of that." Nihlus shrugged slightly. "Fair trial, and passage to the trial. That's what I promised."

Another pause.

Ghatin and Katha exchanged a furtive glance.

"Look, I'm not going to stick around on the Citadel and keep an eye on you two," Nihlus said, shaking his head. "But I'm also not going to give you guys up if you end up being useful to me - and if you're paying your dues. Wasting assets isn't something I do."

"Not gonna pull a Saren?" Ghatin asked, his gaze hard.

"Not my style."

"Okay," Katha said, inhaling and exhaling deeply. "Okay, look - we've - the Sons of Khar'shan mostly got wiped out after the Collapse. Most batarians got wiped out, right? But, like, we had some guys out on runs when the whole thing went down. Most of'em jumped ship, but, uh, things actually worked in our favour. See, our old bosses, they were planning on moving operations out into unknown space before the Collapse, and this gave us the perfect cover."

"Ah - entire system's in disarray, communications infrastructure here is a disaster. What better time to relocate, or something?" Nihlus mused. "So you've been handing off salvage for this new base of yours, thinking nobody would notice - or care - about salvage and whatnot being shipped out of Harsa."

"Yeah," Ghatin sighed, closing his eyes for a moment. "Yeah. You got it."

"And the location of this new base of yours?"

"No idea," Katha replied. "Above our pay-grade - we're desk jockeys, number-crunchers."

"Gotta be pretty far, though," Ghatin added. "We've - you know, we do numbers, right? Like, even if the five-day thing has time for drop-offs and refuelling and taking long routes that's still a lot of travel. I'm guessing it's in the middle of nowhere. Unknown. Unknown space. Right?"

Nihlus glanced at Itok - and Raetor, who was carrying a limp slaver covered in a straightjacket-pattern restraint into the room - with a frown. "You guys buy that?"

"I do," Raetor grunted, dumping his unconcious prisoner onto the floor.

"Same," Itok offered.

Nihlus paused for a moment, expression thoughtful, before nodding to himself. "Alright. And the lady you took prisoner - Bekhamis? Why'd you take her?"

"One of the guys you cooked in the barracks," Ghatin replied, expression stiffening, "he was one of our tech guys - he found her poking around in our network, and she found some info or whatever that our bosses wanted kept under wraps. She was gonna get shipped off to wherever our new base is with the rest of our cargo."

"Anything else you two want to share?"

"That's pretty much all we know that'll be useful," Katha said, sighing. "Rest, you'll find on the servers. We didn't wipe them - you cooked our tech guys, and we don't have admin access."

"For your sakes, you'd better hope that's the case," Nihlus pointed out. "I might not be Saren, but I could always hand you two over to him."

Ghatin nodded furiously, "Promise, Spectre. No lies. None."

"Good. That's nice to hear. Trustworthy criminals are always a pleasure to deal with," Nihlus said, smirking as he opened the comm menu in his HUD. "Lightspear, this is Spectre Kryik, requesting prisoner exfil."

"I hear you, Nihlus," Larix replied. "We'll make our way over to the primary docking hatch - what's the package?"

"Three prisoners - one unconscious and two awake."

"I'll have a team waiting and ready. Your friend - Bekhamis - she's already in the medbay, by the way - stable and holding," Larix added.

"Spirits bless. I'll need the ship to stick around, at least for a little bit - need some techs down here to pull data off these servers. ETA?"

"Two minutes, tops."

"Alright - we'll be there. Out." Nihlus gestured at Itok with his free hand, and jerked his head at the two batarians. "Get up. My salarian friend is taking point. You'll follow him, slowly, and we'll all make our way over to the primary airlock. No sudden movements - it'd be a real shame, having to kill you two after you've managed to make it this far."

With his shotgun aimed at their backs, Nihlus, Itok and Raetor - who, once again, hoisted his prisoner over his shoulder - escorted their two captured slavers to the primary airlock, which was a few hatches down from the hatch they'd breached through; not long after, the airlock's docking port cycled, and a small crowd of the Lightspear Apex's personnel appeared. The security team from the ship took the prisoners back onto the ship, while a handful of technicians took off towards the control room at Raetor's prompting. Larix stepped into view as the ship's crew got to work, stepping into the station and greeting Nihlus with a lazy salute.

"Spectre Kryik," Larix said, smiling.

"Larix."

"Congratulations. You managed to finish an op without putting the ship in mortal danger. Astonishing, really."

"Sometimes I surprise myself," Nihlus shot back, grinning.

"Heh. You mentioned needing to stick around?" Larix asked.

"Yeah - I've got to sort some stuff out with the original, civilian residents of this place. Once that's done we'll head straight back to the Citadel."

"Mmm. Think you'll be long?"

"Nah."

"Fair enough. Well - just call ahead when you're done. We'll keep the ship ready to go."

Larix nodded at Itok and Raetor before disappearing back into the ship's hangar bay; with that business settled the group returned to civilians' side of the station, Nihlus broadcasting an all-clear over an open frequency as they walked. Karos was waiting for them outside the mess hall, and behind him Nihlus could see the station's citizens working to dismantle the hastily-built barricade of tables, chairs and spare bulkheads they'd erected earlier.

"Spectre Kryik," Karos shouted, waving as the group approached. "It's - it's done? The station's safe? Bekhamis is alright?"

"Bekhamis is in, uh, poor condition, but she's already receiving medical attention. As for the station - you're in the clear, Karos," Nihlus said, flashing a smile at the harried-looking man. "The Sons of Khar'shan - the ones on the station, anyway, are either dead or being taken to the Citadel."

"The ones on the station. Right." Karos' smile deflated, and he looked at the ceiling with an anxious expression. "It...occurs to me that the, ah, colleagues of the men you've just dealt with are going to be returning shortly."

"You've got their old armoury and defenses at your disposal," Itok interjected. "Let the bastards in close, and you can chew them up with their own guns."

"I suppose," Karos muttered uneasily. "Though none of my people are exactly what I'd call experts at combat."

"That'll be the worst-case scenario," Nihlus said reassuringly. "Look - I can't promise you anything big, but I'll be sure to have some sort of security force sent here to keep an eye on things. At least a few ships."

"I - that means a lot to me, Spectre Kryik," Karos replied after a few moments. "Even if you didn't come here to help my people, or me, specifically, you - I know you're under no obligation to devote resources to a tiny station like this one."

"There aren't many batarians left - especially not in batarian space," Nihlus said, gaze unfocused. "If Palaven was destroyed, I know a lot of turians who'd cling to the system, even if it meant being alone, cut-off, stranded in the middle of dangerous territory."

"Mmm." Karos shrugged, and smiled weakly. "Not a sentiment you share?"

"No offense, Karos, but your, uh, current surrounds? Bad place to be, tactically speaking," Nihlus scoffed. "Home is here," he mused, patting his chest rig. "Nice and safe."

"How practical of you, Spectre," Karos said, shaking his head. "You know, back in the old days, I think I'd have agreed with you. Passed between masters and whatnot - home was, indeed, with me. Now? Having lost Khar'shan? I'm free - more free - than I've ever been in my life, and here I am, sticking around." The batarian shrugged, and barked out a laugh. "Funny, when you think about it."

"If you and your people want out-"

"-we don't-"

"-the offer stands," Nihlus said, sighing. "I'm serious. I get it, kind of. But - look, there's a better life than this. Khar'shan's not a planet you can go back to. It's not like Tuchanka or whatever. There's nothing. Just - just rocks, dust, dark energy anomalies. You're free, Karos."

"Free to choose," Karos relied, standing straighter. "The result is less important to us, Nihlus. Hardship? This is nothing. A bit of water rationing here, a bit of suspicion there. Compared to our old lives, this is heaven."

"Sure," Raetor noted, "but you could come to the Citadel - or literally any other major planet or system - and get by much more easily."

"We could," Karos answered, shrugging. "Maybe we will, in time. For now, mere freedom is sweet enough for us lowborn."

"If it's your choice," Nihlus said, shrugging.

"It is. In any case - we're in your debt. And thank you for going the extra distance for us." Karos held out his arm, and smiled. "You greeted me like a batarian. Allow me to send you off like a turian." Nihlus clasped arms with Karos, smiling back, and Karos nodded approvingly.. "Best of luck, Spectre - wherever it is you end up. And tell Bekhamis that she's always welcome to come back, too,"

"I will," Nihlus answered, letting go over the batarian's arm. "Keep well and strong, Karos."


	6. CITADEL ARC I-ii: Hunt

**CITADEL ARC I: RESCUE** _Personal comments over. Now, actual briefing. Have questions, please interrupt. Scrutiny, curiosity, drive to know more - all of these things critical to our work. Look stupid now, survive when it counts._  
 **PART TWO: "HUNT"** _Turian saying: "knowledge sharpens the dullest talon." No longer a kind saying. Literal meaning is now true for you. Opposite, too. Ignorance leads to failure. Failure leads to extinction, or worse. Read briefing materials, then read again. And again._  
 **The Citadel** _First assignment is not a test run. No time to ease you in. Citadel posting is not openly dangerous, not like working in Terminus or uncharted space or beyond. That is the threat. Most cannot fight what is invisible, intangible, incomprehensible. No longer true for you._  
 **11th of Skies, 2378 Galactic Standard / 1895 Council Era** _Greatest danger of all is the one that strikes in a place of safety. No civilians. No soldiers. No politicians. No personnel. Only assets. All expendable. Assets made to be used up. Spent. You, me, Council, Director, Command. Friends. Family. Colleagues. Spend wisely._

Bekhamis Sae'feth opened her eyes and lurched upright with a hacking, wheezing cough, her sight hazy and unfocused. She was sitting in a bed - soft, very soft - and there were four people standing around her: turian, salarian, asari, quarian. They were indistinct, blurry figures, but the turian man who spoke was instantly recognizable.

"Hey, hey, easy," Nihlus warned as the asari pushed her back down.

"Listen to the Spectre," the asari added. "Give the stimulants a minute to work their magic and you'll be raring to go in no time."

Bekhamis sank back into the bed, shut her eyes and focused on breathing for several moments; as a sense of calm and steadiness returned to her, Bekhamis spoke aloud, her throat dry and voice raspy.

"The station. Safe? Is it safe?"

"Secure as it'll ever be," Nihlus reassured, patting her on the shoulder. "I worked some stuff out, managed to get two patrol frigates stationed there, at least for the next little while. I know it's not really a permanent solution, but still." He trailed off, shrugging slightly. "How're you feeling?"

"Awful." Bekhamis considered herself for a moment, then re-opened her eyes; the light was less painful now and her sight almost entirely restored. "Well, less awful than before. Gods know I've been through worse." She paused, and looked around the room; she didn't recognize anyone except for Nihlus.

"Itok and Raetor - my fireteam," Nihlus explained, smiling at Bekhamis' now-lucid gaze as he gestured to himself and his two companions, all of them dressed in casual clothes. "And this is Doctor T'Perro."

"You were in rough shape when you arrived here, Miss Sae'feth," the doctor - clad in a white-blue labcoat - said with a nod. "You're on the Citadel - Chalua Hospital, to be precise."

"We transferred you off the Lightspear Apex as soon as we arrived," Nihlus explained. "Normally the medbay folks would have preferred to keep you onboard until you'd made a full recovery, but the Council needs you up and about to hear that intel you messaged me about."

"Hope it's as important as you say it is," Itok muttered, "or we'll have gotten you up early for nothing."

"It is," Bekhamis replied, glancing at the doctor.

"If you need me to leave-"

"-no, it's alright," Nihlus interjected, shaking his head at the doctor. "We'll get out of your workspace, let you finish up with Bekha. Important or not, I need you one-hundred-percent lucid if I'm going to bring you up to the Council. Take your time, alright? We'll be waiting outside."

"Got you fresh clothes, too," Raetor added, pointing at a small duffel bag in the corner of the room. "See you soon."

She - and the doctor - watched the trio go.

Doctor T'Perro sighed and rubbed at her forehead. "Soldiers.. Anyhow, Miss Sae'feth, how're you feeling? Spectre Kryik's medbay crew did most of the work for me - all I did was administer some high-grade stimulants and boosters they didn't have access to."

"I won't lie, Doctor, I'm not exactly feeling good," Bekhamis admitted. "Whole body hurts. My chest feels like someone hit it with a jackhammer. And my eyesight's still a bit hazy."

"Well, the vision problems should fade in a few hours. As for the aches, well, those are going to be around for at least another few days," Doctor T'Perro explained with a shrug. "Unavoidable side-effect of waking you too early, though of course painkillers, medigels and stim-patches can help you get around the worst of it."

"So? What's keeping me here?"

"I need to keep an eye on you until the first round of stimulants cycles through your system. Won't take more than a few minutes. Side effects are uncommon, but the last thing I need on my record is discharging you early and having you vomit yourself into unconsciousness in front of the Council." Turning around for a moment, Doctor T'Perro handed a large bottle of water to Bekhamis and nodded at it. "Drink up. All of it. Hunger you can figure out, but you've got a serious hydration deficit to make up for."

Bekhamis started sipping from the bottle and staring blankly off into space while the doctor busied herself with her omnitool; she broke the silence a few minutes later without looking at the doctor.

"You seem pretty relaxed, considering a Spectre just rolled through here."

"Nihlus? He's not the first one I've dealt with," Doctor T'Perro offered. "One of the easier ones to work with, if you ask me. Less stubborn. You know him well?"

"Not really, no," Bekhamis replied, smiling slightly. "I used to send him information from the Hegemony. Of course, back then, travel was difficult at best, so I only ever met him in person a handful of times."

"Oh. My, ah, condolences."

"Nothing to be sorry about. Collapse was the best thing to ever happen to the batarians as a whole," Bekhamis snorted. "Liberty. All it cost was our homeworld and everyone on it. Mind you, I'm not complaining."

The asari winced slightly. "A brutal calculation."

"Doesn't change whether it's true or not, though." She drank more of the water, swallowed. "My people are free. I'm free. The Collapse killed a lot of innocent people, sure, but the end result…"

Bekhamis trailed off.

"Are you feeling alright?" Doctor T'Perro stared into Bekhamis' eyes, gaze hard and steely. "I mean it. I can't imagine any batarian being in the best headspace at the moment, and your - you've come to terms with the situation in a way that seems rather detached."

"I prefer to think of myself as being realistic about the situation."

"Realistic or not, that doesn't change the fact that you need to take care of yourself."

"I am."

"I'm sure."

Another pause.

"Well," Doctor T'Perro said, checking her omnitool, "you're looking more or less alright, all things considered. Make sure that you get lots of rest - as much of it as you can for the next week or so. Stay hydrated and well-fed. And try not to get into any shootouts?"

"I'm not planning on it," Bekhamis replied, grunting as she pushed herself out of the bed and onto her feet.

"You're keeping company with a Spectre," T'Perro sighed. "The odds of you not getting into some sort of altercation are astoundingly low, by my estimates." She handed Bekhamis the duffel bag; inside was a set of simple, grey-white clothes, as well as a black waistcoat and a set of combat boots. Ignoring the shooting pains in her limbs, Bekhamis changed out of her hospital gown, slipped into her new clothes and stretched before tossing the gown into a nearby basket.

"So? Am I free to go?"

"You are. I'll take care of your discharge info," the asari said, frowning. "I'm sure you've got more pressing things to take care of than paperwork."

"I do. Thanks for everything, Doctor T'Perro."

"You can thank me by not ending up in a hospital again," the doctor replied, shaking her head. "Not that I think you're going to follow my orders."

"I'll try."

Unused to the comfort of her new, fresh clothes, Bekhamis made her way out of the patient wards and back out to the front of the hospital; there, Nihlus and his crew were waiting, seated on one of the many benches placed by the drop-off zone. They waved at her before getting up; Itok peeled off from the group and headed towards the hospital's parking lot, while Raetor and Nihlus met her at the curbside, coming to a stop in front of her.

"Bekhamis," Nihlus said, grinning and offering his both of his hands face-up.

"Nihlus," Bekhamis replied, placing her hands on top of his. "Next time you come to pick me up, I'd prefer you show up a little earlier."

"Sorry. Old ride got totaled. Had to find a new one. How're you feeling now?"

"Fine." She stretched and looked around, taking in the spacious skylanes and muted greenery which surrounded Chalua Hospital with a feeling of relief, envy and anger - though the anger passed quickly, "So? What's the plan?"

"Itok's gone to get the car," Nihlus explained. "Once we're in, we head straight to the Council and you give your report. Preferably, you fill me in along the way."

Bekhamis nodded. "Mmm. Fair enough."

"You look off."

"Second time on the Citadel for me," the batarian replied, turning her gaze back to the endless stream of aircars overhead. "Last time I was here, I was a kid. And a slave."

"Things feel different?" Nihlus asked quietly.

"Too early to say. Everything smells nice, though, so that's a plus." She turned as a black, boxy airvan covered in dents and scratches swerved its way around the cars above them and descended rapidly, landing in the waiting zone not far from them. "That our ride?"

The window of the airvan rolled down, and Itok leaned out of the driver's seat. "I thought we were on a schedule? Let's go," the salarian shouted.

"It is," Nihlus replied, nodding as he began walking towards the van, Raetor and Bekhamis in tow.

"Looks like a piece of junk," Bekhamis snorted. "Surely a Spectre could afford better?"

"It's called blending in," Raetor replied, shrugging.. "Sure, we could rip around the CItadel in some flashy sports car, but that'd draw attention. Plus, there's more room for stuff in the van. Comes in handy all the time."

"Guns?"

"People, usually," Itok answered, still leaning out of the window. "You ever tried stuffing a krogan into the back of a subcompact?"

"Getting 'em in isn't the hard part," Nihlus added, opening the back door for Bekhamis. "Getting a krogan out is way worse. So yeah, no more small cars."

The inside of the van was considerably nicer than the exterior, Bekhamis thought as she strapped herself in to the back seat; the upholstery was reasonably soft, the car itself looked nearly pristine and the rear half of the van held two large storage lockers which stretched from floor to roof. The others joined her in the car - Raetor in the back with her and Nihlus in the passenger's seat - and as they rose into the air, Itok shut the windows, flipped a small toggle which polarized the windows and Nihlus popped open the glovebox.

"Here," Nihlus said, reaching into the unusually roomy compartment and withdrawing a small white handgun. "If you're with us, you stay armed at all times - and careful, it's loaded."

Bekhamis took the weapon and examined the compacted firearm; it was devoid of markings, save for a stylized flower emblem.

"Looks fancy," Bekhamis muttered; while she was no stranger to expensive firearms, this pistol - sleek, ergonomic and lightweight - screamed luxury. "Controls?"

"Unholstering function's on the left side toggle. Hold during uncompacting for automatic switch to semi, tap to keep on safe. Second switch behind that toggles semi and full-auto. You can get about twenty shots off before it overheats," Raetor explained. "Heatsink ejector and reload is through the grip, like normal. Compact switch is on the right."

"Feels good. This custom-made?" Bekhamis asked, pointing the weapon at her window and uncompacting it. "It's light - really light. This thing feels fancy as the hells."

"Yup. Custom built - Rae and I work with this gunsmithing shop, fab custom designs. This one hasn't got a name yet, but we're all running variants of the same design. Ninety percent parts compatibility with Thessian Skunkworks Attendant pistols - basically everything except the trigger and control pacl. We worked off a scaled-down Phaeston design for that."

"I think this might be worth more money than I've ever had in my life," Bekhamis snorted. "Heatsinks?"

"Yeah, here," Nihlus replied, handing her a handful of small silver-red sticks; Bekhamis took them, slipped them into the breast pocket of her coat and did the same with her new firearm.

"So. I'm armed. We're off to the Council. Anything else I should know?"

"Not that I can think of," Nihlus replied, smirking. "It's all common sense from here on out. Anyhow, the van's shielded - if you're ready, I wouldn't mind having you fill me in on the details of your intel briefing. I'd rather not go into a meeting with the Council and get blindsided by info, mhmm?"

"Yeah, I get it." Bekhamis sighed, steeled herself, and began. "About three weeks before the Collapse, I was just doing my usual thing - feeding you info on state sec, slaver rings, right? I was just doing some digging around in government databases on a tip I got from an inside man in Batarian State Sec, and found rumours that the Hegemony actually found an unused mass relay."

"Oh, fantastic," Itok grumbled as he drove. "Please tell me we're not going to have to piss around uncharted space looking for Hegemony holdouts."

"No, no, you're in luck," Bekhamis chuckled. "Amazingly, the government decided that maybe, _just_ maybe, activating a dormant relay without any prior research might be a bad idea."

"Common sense from the Hegemony. Now there's a miracle," Nihlus spat. "So - they didn't activate it. They tag the location?"

"Not that I could find - government had kept the location under wraps," Bekhamis replied. "Anyway, Collapse happens, batarian government and society crumbles, et cetera, right? I ended up on Respite station with those other civs and thought things were going pretty good, 'til those slavers kicked down our door and set up shop. I figured I'd do a little digging, see what was up with their transports and their whole moving-gear thing, and that's when I found out. The Sons of Kar'shan found the dormant relay-"

"-and they activated it?" Raetor blurted. "No. Come on, nobody's that stupid." He paused, scowling. "Okay, maybe they are. Still, that's nuts."

"Exactly. As of right now there's an unsecured relay just - just sitting there in the middle of nowhere," Bekhamis continued, "and the only people who've gone through it are a bunch of slave-trading scumbags trying to set up a new base of operations. I mean, I don't think it's likely that there's anything out there, but on the off chance that there is? I"d prefer not to do a contact scenario after leaving an impression like that. So - I tried to comm you, got caught, and the rest is history."

Nihlus sighed and banged his head against his window. "Spirits. Oh, this is great, just brilliant. We gotta haul ass out there and bag those idiots, fast. Unsecured relay - why? Why would they do that?"

"Better question," Raetor muttered, "how did they find the damn thing? I mean, if it was secret enough that not even the Batarian State Security servers had access, there's no way a bunch of slavers that were, at best, middle-of-the-pack before the Collapse just stumbled upon the damn thing."

"Totally possible," Itok pointed out. "Improbable, but possible."

"Their records said they got a tip from an ex-State Sec agent," Bekhamis explained, "but they didn't have a name. No footage or photos, either - there wasn't any lead for me to follow."

"Had to have been high up, though," Nihlus mused, rubbing his fringe. "So - problem one, unsecured relay. Two, slavers past the relay. Three, ex-BSS agent on the loose. Well, I suppose it could be worse."

"Hopefully your ship's technicians can pull some more data off their servers," Bekhamis sighed. "I know it's not much to go on-"

"-you did good," Nihlus interjected. "Better than nothing. If you hadn't come in, best case we'd have to deal with slavers without knowing where they were operating, and worst case we'd have some sort of insane contact scenario to deal with. So - thanks."

"Mmm."

"Well, the response seems pretty cut-and-dry, at least," Raetor offered.

"Slaver hunting is always a fun gig," Itok added, nodding. "Not so hot on the whole 'uncharted space' thing, but whatever. You think the Council's gonna give us some backup?"

"Hope so. I'd really prefer to have at least a carrier or two nearby for support," Nihlus said, closing his eyes. "Of course, now that I've said it..."

He trailed off, and the rest of the ride passed in silence.

Not long later, they cleared the rows of C-Sec vehicles which maintained a cordon around the parking lots next to the Citadel Tower. Itok promptly landed the airvan in one of the reserved priority spots close to the entrance, and the group made their way over to the Council Chambers, weaving in and out of the usual mass of politicians, office workers and lobbyists who filled the halls. They waited patiently while a pair of turians finished their discussion with the Council before approaching the raised dais where the Council - Fallox Sparatus, Saral Valern and Herane Tevos - waited.

"Spectre Kryik," Fallox said with a curt nod, "thank you for waiting. You indicated in your message that your batarian contact was discharged from the hospital - I assume this is the woman you were speaking about?"

"That's correct, Councilor Sparatus," Nihlus replied. "This is Bekhamis Sae'feth," he continued, gesturing at Bekhamis, "and she's brought to light some troubling news regarding the movements of a certain slave-trading ring which was, up until the operation my fireteam carried out two days ago, operating near the ruins of Kar'shan."

"I see," Saral noted. "Miss Sae'feth, thank you for coming forward - though if I recall correctly this isn't the first time you've assisted Spectre Kryik."

"It isn't, Councilors," Bekhamis answered. "I've worked with him on several occasions, though rarely in-person."

"Fair enough. Your work is, nonetheless, appreciated," Herane added. "In Spectre Kryik's original memo to us, he noted that your request for aid claimed you had information which we would want to know. Is this something you'd feel should be spoken of in private?"

Bekhamis nodded, glancing at Nihlus. "Absolutely. If there's a secure briefing room of some sort we could use, I think that would be best."  
"Very well. Spectre Kryik, we'll meet you in the usual room," Fallox said as he flicked through the controls at his podium's terminal; a massive hatch hissed out of the walls by the entrance, separating the Council Chambers and the halls of the Council Tower. Nihlus led his group into a small foyer to the right of the main Council Chambers, past a trio of silent, heavily-armoured and even more heavily-armed guards, and into a small meeting room. The interior was sparsely decorated, furnished only with a small circular conference table, a dozen metal chairs and a series of jammers built into the walls. The three Councilors were already seated at one end of the table, and they waited patiently as Nihlus' group sat across from them.

"Well, you have the floor," Councilor Valern noted as the conference room's doors sealed with an audible click. "Feel free to use the holo in the table, as well."

Bekhamis took a few minutes to explain the same things she'd told Nihlus on the trip to the Council Tower; at the very end, she clicked through a few screens on her omnitool, and the table's holodisplay lit up with a galaxy map.  
"And," Councilor Sparatus said slowly, his expression grave, "this is the location of this unsecured relay? I can't claim to understand the Protheans, but I find it rather odd that it's placed in the middle of nowhere."

"Indeed," Saral continued. "Relays in remote locations are nothing new, but to have one that's at least a day's - two days, maybe - travel from the nearest relay connection seems bizarre."

"I'm afraid that, strange or not, this is all the information I have, Councilors," Bekhamis replied. "Of course, I can't confirm that my information is one hundred percent true - the information I got from the servers those slavers were using could be a misdirection - but frankly their operation didn't seem that sophisticated to me."

"Even if this intel ends up being incorrect," Nihlus added, "I think any sort of information which implies an unsecured relay being used by any group - let alone a slave-trading ring - demands an immediate response."

The Councilors looked at one another, and in unison they nodded.

"We agree," Councilor Tevos replied. "Once ready, your new orders are to take the Lightspear Apex and clarify the situation. The first order of business is to confirm whether or not there is, in fact, an unsecured relay at the aforementioned location. If the information is correct, you will hold position, intercept any ships coming out of the relay and otherwise wait for backup."

"The Council will discuss this matter internally," Councilor Sparatus mused, "but in the meantime, you can expect at least one or two carriers to go through the relay with you. Your job, then, will be to scout out the area beyond the relay and, if possible, hunt down those slavers while the Citadel Fleet secures the space surrounding the relay. We'll also ensure that the Spectre Office is updated with a memo regarding this mystery informant - though I find it difficult to believe anyone will just stumble upon an ex-State Sec agent without a proper lead, at least your colleagues will be alerted. Is all of that clear?"

Nihlus nodded. "Yes, Councilors. I'll get back to the ship, and make ready to leave."

"Very good. Well, we won't hold you any longer," Herane noted with a smile. "Of course, this information must remain under wraps for the foreseeable future - please inform your crew, Spectre Kryik."

"As for you, Miss Sae'feth," Saral added, "will you be staying with Spectre Kryik?"

"I haven't decided yet," the batarian replied, frowning.

The Councilors looked at one another before chuckling slightly; they stopped after a moment, and Fallox sighed with a grin.

"Ah, apologies. It's just that many of the other people who work with Spectre Kryik have said much the same thing," Councilor Sparatus noted. "He seems to have attracted a rather eclectic mix of personnel over the years. Whatever you end up doing, best of luck."

"I - thank you, Councilors."

With a tap of his omnitool, Councilor Valern re-opened the doors to the conference room and unsealed the Council Chamber security hatch; Nihlus and the others left, and returned to the parking lot in silence. They re-entered the van, and it was Itok who broke the silence as he started the engines.

"So? Are you staying on with us?" Itok asked as he drove back out of the lot and merged back into traffic. "I mean, no rush, or anything, but we're probably going to be back on the job in a few hours."

"Itok's ribbing aside, you're under no obligation to come with me," Nihlus pointed out as he leaned back from the passenger seat to smile at Bekhamis. "I can imagine you might actually want some calm in your life at this point - just say the word, and I'll set you up with a place to live and a bit of cash to work with while you look for a job or something."

"That's - that's almost suspiciously generous of you," Bekhamis muttered as the stared at the endless traffic beyond her window. "Especially coming from someone who drives a clunker like this thing, and yes, I know, blending in, not being flashy."

"I have credit to work with," Nihlus replied with a shrug. "The Council might not pay me, per se, but you do get a lot of...perks, being a Spectre. Plenty of free - or discounted - things tend to float our way. Not to mention the fact that we've been taking down some rather wealthy people recently, which means more cash to invest, and so on. I'm not offering you a mansion and a pension, or anything, mind you. Just something to get by for a bit."

"No. No, no, I think I'll just stay on with you guys," Bekhamis said after a long pause. "I'm, uh, I don't think I'd make a very good civilian. And gods know I'd be bored out of my mind waiting tables or something. Do I have to, I don't know, clean the ship's toilets or anything?"

"Technically the ship's jointly owned by the Turian Army, so you'll officially have the shipboard rank of 'Spectre-Requisition Civilian Contractor," Raetor explained. "No pay, no benefits and whatnot, but in theory it also means we don't have to help out around the ship or follow any of the regulations."

"In theory."

"Well, yeah," Raetor replied, shrugging. "Like, we don't have to help out around the ship. We could just leave shit everywhere, not pull our weight, but all that'd do is piss off the crew. Itok and I tend to help the ship's engineers, while Nihlus keeps busy doing his Spectre stuff."

"Not much good with ship engines and the like," Bekhamis snorted. "Gotta be somewhere I can help out, though - I'm a lot better at running, gunning and infiltrating places than I am fixing machinery."

"If you're willing to put yourself in danger," Nihlus said, "you're more than welcome to come along on our ground missions."

"That wasn't a condition for me coming along?"  
Nihlus stared at Bekhamis, frowning. "No? I wasn't planning on forcing you into firefights if you weren't on board with it. Honestly, I was kinda hoping you'd be around to help me sort through all the intel and mail I get."

Bekhamis blinked, then smirked. "If it's alright with you, I think I'll stick to the whole 'breaking and entering' business."

Nihlus leaned back in his seat. "Nobody ever wants to do the filing and paperwork. Maybe I should actually hire someone to do this stuff for me. Now there's an ad: 'Local Spectre seeks receptionist. Must enjoy handling classified data and sitting on a ship in the middle of nowhere for long periods of time.' Heh, I bet I'd actually have people lining up to apply."

"Yeah, no. I'm good. Anyway – if I'm not getting paid by the Turian Army, and you're not paid, how do I get by ? I get the feeling I don't qualify for basic income."

"Eh, it's not that bad," Itok replied a few moments later as the van queued to get through a toll lane. "We've all got investments in a few banks, and whatever we steal-"

Nihlus groaned. "-it's not stealing-"

"-sorry, ahem, whatever illicit goods we requisition from the formerly living," Itok snorted, "we get to keep. Generally we just divvy up credits, both loose and from whatever we sell, in equal measure. Actual loot we negotiate amongst ourselves, though it's rarely much trouble."

"Alternative procurement," Raetor added with a grin, "sounds a lot better than 'looted from corpse' when we fill out after-action reports. Larix - that's Captain Larix Quentis, the guy who's actually in charge of the ship on a day-to-day basis - appreciates it when we tidy up our reports to sound real nice."

"I was under the impression that Spectres are above the law," Bekhamis mused with a smirk. "I figured that applied to paperwork, too."

"It's true. Technically I don't have to do paperwork or file reports, except to the Council," Nihlus noted, "but I find that people are quicker to trust a Spectre who keeps those things in mind. Spectres like Saren and Wrex? Yeah, they don't do paperwork. They also tend to shoot first and not bother asking questions. I like to give the other side a sporting chance."

"Why bother?" Bekhamis asked, squinting. "Maybe it's the terrorist - ahem, resistance fighter - in me talking here, but why announce yourself to hostiles? Just sounds like bad tactics, if you ask me."

"Short term, sure. Strategically, it pays off. I have a better reputation," Nihlus countered. "If Saren or Wrex or any of those other shoot-first types ever need to negotiate, it's down the sights of a gun. Me, well, people lower their guard, are more open to giving up without a fight."

"If they know you," Raetor pointed out. "How many times have we gotten the whole 'never heard of a Spectre Kryik' thing now?"

"I don't keep track, and it's not a common thing," Nihlus protested. "Maybe twice?

"Actually, it's three in the past year," Itok pointed out. "I keep track."

"Like the hells, it is." Nihlus shook his head. "You're sure you want to stick around, Bekhamis? This is the kind of crap you're going to be dealing with, every day."

"It's a step up from my previous surroundings. I think I'll handle it well," Bekhamis replied, smiling at Raetor. "My old line of work didn't have a lot of levity. Guess I'll have to make up for lost time."

Nihlus pressed his forehead against his window. "Don't you even start."

A few minutes of driving later the van pulled into a private hangar, where a single unpainted ship was docked; it was a sleek, curved vessel, maybe double or triple the size of most frigates, uniformly sleek save for four forward-swept wing-like protrusions jutting out of the rear of the craft.

"The _Lightspear Apex_ ," Utok said grandly, gesturing with one hand at the docked ship while he parked the van in a small garage off to the side of the hangar. "She's fast, stealthy and armed to the teeth with the latest in, well, just about everything."

"Nice ride," Bekhamis muttered. "Can't imagine how much it cost."

"Nothing, for me. Benefits of being a Spectre - when the Turian Navy offers you a custom-made ship and lets you pick most of the crew, you don't say no," Nihlus replied with a shrug. "Come on - let's get you onboard and set up."

Once the group had secured the van, they made their way up the main ramp to the main access hatch of the Lightspear Apex, which was mounted near the front of the ship; a small scanner mounted on the side of the hatch lit up at their approach, flashing yellow when Bekhamis came within view of the camera.

"Identification complete. Bekhamis Sae'feth, previous tags: medical, VIP. Requesting update of designation," came MARCA's smooth, synthetic voice from the hatch's speakers.

Nihlus rubbed at his fringe. "Spectre authorization Nihlus Kryik, update designators for Bekhamis Sae'feth."

"Receiving."

"Remove tags medical and VIP. Add tag, Spectre-Requisition Civilian Contractor."

"Authorized. Contractor Bekhamis Sae'feth, your designation has been updated," MARCA replied. "Welcome aboard."

The hatch hissed as it slid open, revealing a small airlock which the group stepped into; once it cycled, they were deposited into a small holding zone where a trio of turian marines stood guard. They nodded at Nihlus and his crew, smiling as they realized Bekhamis was with them.

"How'd the meeting with the Council go, Nihlus? We shipping out?" one of the marines asked.

"Classified," Nihlus replied with a nod. "Yes, we are - briefing will happen soon, so just sit tight."

With a nod, Nihlus lead his group out of the holding area and into the ship's Combat Information Centre; there, Captain Quentis stood atop the command deck, overlooking the star map which was projected from the large holotable which took up the centre of the room. He turned at the sound of Nihlus' approach, and promptly jumped down from the raised platform to clasp arms with Nihlus.

"Back already, Nihlus?" Larix asked, expression a mix of confusion and concern. "Quick meeting."

"Yeah, there wasn't too much to discuss. We're shipping out right away," Nihlus explained. "Recon run - as soon as the ship's ready, we gotta leave. I'll do a debrief once we're up - everyone needs to be here for it."

"Of course. One second," Larix replied, raising his omnitool and keying in a few commands.

"MARCA to all personnel," the AI announced. "Order from Captain Quentis: immediate launch, holding at relay Widow. Briefing to follow, priority one."

The CIC erupted into a flurry of activity as the ship's crew made ready to depart the Citadel, and a few minutes later the ship rumbled as it detached from the docking bay and began flying to the Widow mass relay. Personnel from all over the ship began filtering into the CIC not long after, and Nihlus stood at the far end of the holotable, directly opposite Larix's raised podium.

"Alright, everyone listen up," Nihlus shouted as the last of the engineers arrived. "First up, I'm sure you all remember Bekhamis - she's staying on with us for the foreseeable future." A chorus of approving murmurs went through the crowd, and Nihlus waved a hand for quiet. "Our next job, like usual, comes straight from the Council, with intel sourced by Bekhamis herself. There's a chance that the slavers we took down two days ago might have activated a dormant mass relay and we're being sent to go see if that's true."

The room broke into nervous shouting as Nihlus tapped at his omnitool; the holotable display flickered, showing a travel route which terminated in a spot not far from the unknown regions of space, and Nihlus cleared his throat, waiting for the shouting to stop once more.

"This is our destination - MARCA, estimated travel time?" Nihlus said, looking up at the ceiling.

"Estimated time of arrival in one day, thirteen hours," the AI replied.

"So there you have it. You've got a day to prep for a recon run - as of right now we're going to scope things out, hold position and signal back to the Citadel. Anybody that's from our side of space comes through that relay, we intercept and detain them. Yes, question over there?" Nihlus asked, pointing at one of the gunnery crew who had raised a hand.

"Yeah, uh, are we going through the relay at some point?"

"We will, once backup arrives. I'm told we'll be getting two carriers, minimum, as support once we actually go through the relay itself - but that's for later. So keep your heads on straight and do your jobs. Obviously this information's classified, and as of now the only people who know about this besides the people aboard this ship are members of the Council - so if this leaks, and you'd better hope it doesn't, I'm going to sit every one of you down until I find the loudmouth. Got it?"

"Yes, Spectre!" came the shouted reply.

"Good. Dismissed!"

Bekhamis watched as the ship's crew, as well as Itok and Raetor - filed out of the room, and waited for the CIC to return to normal status before approaching Nihlus; she tapped him on the shoulder and jerked her head at the holodisplay.

"Day to kill, eh? What should I be doing?" Bekhamis asked.

"Well, I've got to get you geared up, and you need a place to sleep," Nihlus muttered. "Whichever one you want first."

"Gear first, I think. Map of the ship would be nice too," Bekhamis noted.

"Mmm. Actually, yeah, that works - we can get you synced up to MARCA's systems while we kit you out. Come on - follow me."

Nihlus lead Bekhamis over to one of the side elevators located behind the CIC and together they rode it down to the bottom deck; engineers and logistics crew were double-checking the restraints which kept the Lightspear Apex's two shuttles and the various supply crates in place. Nobody was manning the armoury station, and so Nihlus simply swiped his omnitool-equipped arm over the large storage rack which was reserved for his personal collection of firearms, and pulled it open to reveal no less than three or four dozen guns of various make and manufacture.

Bekhamis let out a whistle as she examined the weapons, tapping the rack with a finger. "This is all yours?"

"Yeah."

"Alternative procurement?"

"Only a couple. Most of it's stuff I've bought over the years. There's a sim range through the door behind the armoury - feel free to take whatever you want off that rack and test things out. As for gear, we can forge just about anything you might want - and if you step into the fitting scanner in the sim range MARCA can fabricate some fresh armour for you as well. Let me know if you need any help - or, better yet, talk to Raetor or Itok once you've made your choices. Rae knows armour and Itok knows guns - both of them are excellent at fine-tuning gear."

"Nothing complicated for me," Bekhamis said, pulling a dull-white shotgun off the rack and aiming it at a nearby wall. "I've got cloaking subdermals and a nice biotic amp I tore out of a State Sec agent back in the day, fine-tuned for up-close fighting and heavy barrier generation."

"I didn't know you were a biotic," Nihlus said, nodding. "We've been lacking one on the fireteam, actually - you'll make a perfect fit, especially since Rae and Itok tend to hang back during firefights. How's your biotic flexibility?"

"I can do all the basics - pull, push, warp, et cetera. You ever heard of biotic lashes?"

Nihlus frowned, crossing his arms. "No. Never. What - like - like a biotic...whip?"

"Kind of. Pretty common for batarian biotics to learn back in the day - it was one of the first things the Enforcers would teach you," Bekhamis muttered, expression souring. "As much for intimidation as for lethality. Anyway - yeah. I'm guessing you're the pointman for operations?"

"I am - though now that you're here I'll be able to provide a little more mid-range support. Anyway, I've got some intel to sort through - our bunks are actually down the hall from the bathroom in the sim range. Gimme your omnitool arm for a second?"

Bekhamis raised her left arm, and Nihlus waved his over it; a few seconds later, MARCA spoke up from a speaker near the armoury's lockers.

"Passlink systems engaged. Synchronizing to omnitool, user Contractor Sae'feth. Complete. New functions available," MARCA explained. "Please check your omnitool when convenient for a full list of available commands and functions."

"Alright. Thanks, Nihlus, MARCA." Bekhamis pulled a pistol off the rack and clamped it to her belt, nodding at Nihlus. "I'll just be working in the sim range for the next while - anything I need to do, or worry about?"

"No, not really. Uh, don't touch any of the stuff Itok's got laying around on his desk. That's about it," Nihlus replied after a moment. "Oh - and if you need anything or whatever you can just message me, or ask MARCA for help."

* * *

 **[MARCA AUTHENTICATING NEW USER: CONTRACTOR BEKHAMIS SAE'FETH]  
[COMPLETE. HOW MAY I ASSIST?]  
[UNDERSTOOD. I AM TRANSFERRING THE RELEVANT ARTICLES TO YOUR OMNITOOL.]  
**

* * *

CHECKING CLEARANCE: SPECTRE. DISPLAYING ENTRY V1  
 **Database: MARCA**

Spurred on by news of AI development from both the quarians and the salarians, the Turian Hierarchy began work in building their own artificial intelligence constructs; though the precise date of the program's drafting remains classified, the Strategic Artificial Intelligence Development Program wa publicly announced in 2370 Galactic Standard / 1887 Council Era. To date, four artificial intelligence constructs have been produced as a result of the program, itself a joint operation which has seen cooperation between all branches of the Turian Army, as well as the Hierarchy Intelligence Network and even a select few private-sector contractors. Turian Army Strategic Planning Unit Model Zero-Zero-Three is the third AI produced by the SAIDP which is currently in service (the other two being used by the Turian Army's High Command and the Hierarchy Intelligence Network), and is installed on board the _Lightspear Apex_ , the ship used by the Spectre Nihlus Kryik. TASPU-003, better known by its colloquial designation of MARCA, is a tactical analysis and ship operations specialist; it oversees and maintains the efficient organization of personnel aboard the _Lightspear Apex_ , and assists with combat tactics, long-term strategy and navigation-gunnery computations. While access to information beyond that is generally classified, it is also known that MARCA's preferred "voice" emulates a woman speaking the Palaven Formal pronunciation of Palav.

* * *

CHECKING CLEARANCE: SPECTRE. DISPLAYING ENTRY V1  
 **Database: Resonance Drive Core Technology**

Resonance Drive Core technology exploits a dark energy phenomena first discovered by Citadel scientists around 2277 Galactic Standard / 1794 Council Era - specifically, that certain forms of dark energy fields, at specific modulations and strength, are able to interact with the dark energy and dark matter omnipresent in the cosmic background. As these fields overlap and interfere with each other, they serve as a "seed" field. Resonance Drive Cores use a set of symmetric, rotating Mass Effect cores to create a seed field within the central resonance cavity; this field then causes additional background dark energy to manifest inside the Resonance core as a usable output, capable of providing power to any Mass Effect field generation system connected to the core itself.

Increasing the number of individual resonator cores, the size of the resonance chamber and the amount of dark energy applied to the core results in a incredible increase in output power, which trends towards exponential. This breakthrough in power generation promotes, in general, a scaling-up of the resonance cores, making larger spacecraft, higher Faster-Than-Light speeds, tougher kinetic barriers and even more lethal weapon systems all functional for the same up-front eezo investment. The use of RDC technology is not without its downsides; Resonance Drive Cores are non-solid, difficult and expensive to maintain and demand incredible amounts of energy (with capital models demanding gigawatts of power at peak output rating). It is also worth noting that, should the containment field which surrounds the Resonance Drive Core fail, the mass effect cores within - which can number from two to six on standard ships - spinning at millions of revolutions per minute can fail catastrophically, leading to "rapid unscheduled disassembly."

* * *

CHECKING CLEARANCE: SPECTRE. DISPLAYING ENTRY V1  
 **Database: Matter-Conversion Reactor Technology**

Developed as a joint venture between several dozen corporations and governments, the Matter Conversion Reactor was unveiled to the public in 2278 Galactic Standard / 1795 Council Era. Matter Conversion Reactors work by using converting Baryonic matter - that is, matter which contains atoms - into energy via a form of dark energy field-induced photon decay. Essentially, an MCR causes baryonic matter to decay into energy in the form of photons and pions, not unlike any other matter-antimatter annihilation process. However, MCRs do not require an antimatter investment, and as a result can generate a "positive" energy balance compared to antimatter, which is merely a form of energy storage.

The other useful feature of MCRs is that their practical power efficiency is exceptional. The deterioration effect used by MCRs allows them to capture released energy in a form of dark energy, which can be be turned directly into an electrical current flow. This also decreases cooling requirements for MCRs. However, many commercial models use normal hydrogen plasma, ionized by the released radiation and then extract of energy through induction and thermal exchange power generators, and thermal panels in the walls of the reaction chamber, instead of full field absorption, in order to reduce the amount of eezo-related equipment required for dark energy capture.

MCRs can also be used as reaction propulsion engines, with the released radiation from the matter-energy conversion either being used as a high-efficiency, low-impulse photon rocket or a normal reaction mass torch drive. This allows military vessels to sustain operations at a near indefinite-rate (in terms of fuel capacity) by simply siphoning any adequate conversion matter such as hydrogen, helium or water off gas giants and asteroids, and feeding it into their various MCRs. For this reason, modern combat spacecraft are far more aerodynamic than their predecessors, and feature very visible intakes an often carry special auto-dozers and atmospheric miners.


	7. CITADEL ARC I-iii: Grave

**CITADEL ARC I: RESCUE** _Ah, agent. Yes, please, come in - working on new batch of virals, I am listening - yes! Perfectly safe. Assuming you are up-to-date on your innoculants. Of course. Concerns. Yes, go ahead. Speak freely._  
 **PART THREE: "GRAVE"** _Yes, agent. All of us infected, from lowliest field agent to Director herself. I remember being in your position. Question of free will, of freedom to choose, of who - of what - controls your actions very common. Quick to ask, agent - sign of initiative. Very good._  
 **Primary Relay B/SV-314-Alpha** _I ask the same question of myself, correct. If one is told not to eat candy from candy box, and chooses not to, surely not the same as being unable to take the candy, yes? Maybe. Sanctity of the mind, sanctity of perception - fictions. The mind is a pliable thing._  
 **13th of Skies, 2378 Galactic Standard / 1895 Council Era** _Can't forget, agent. Survival at any cost. Any. We will survive, and when we secure our survival we will be punished for our crimes. As it should be. I look forward to that day. Everyone does. Director too. You will, eventually._

"We've arrived at the relay and are holding position at one light minute stand-off as ordered. Can we expect to have our escort soon?" Nihlus asked.

The holograms of the Councilors nodded in unison, and Councilor Sparatus cleared his throat.

"Actually, Spectre Kryik, we sent three carriers, along with their task forces to assist you - they departed not long after you left, as a matter of fact. They should be there within a few hours at the absolute latest."

Nihlus blinked with ill-concealed astonishment, before composing himself. "That's excellent news. Thank you for your prompt response, Councilors. May I ask which carriers they are?"

"Of course. You'll be assisted by the Salarian Union Navy's Light Cruiser _Anarchy_ , the Turian Navy's own Supercarrier _Nomad_ and the Citadel Fleet Carrier _Discovery_ ," Saral explained. "Operational command falls to you, followed by _Discovery_ , then _Nomad_ and finally _Anarchy_."

"Thank you, Councilors. If that's all, I'll start preparing for their arrival," Nihlus replied.

Herane nodded and smiled. "Best of luck, Spectre Kryik."

The holograms winked out, leaving the private communications room lit only by the dim glowstrips of the floor-mounted lighting system. Nihlus remained still for a few moments, mulling over the information in his head, before taking a deep breath and striding confidently back out into the corridors of the _Lightspear Apex_. Nodding at the ship's personnel as he walked, Nihlus jogged over to the bridge, where Larix was sitting next to Valtha in the co-pilot's (normally empty) seat.

"Ah, Nihlus, good to see you. What's the word?" Larix asked, getting up to clasp arms with Nihlus.

"Somehow we managed to get ourselves three carriers, along with their escorts," Nihlus replied with a nod. "I'm not going to complain - the more backup we have going through that relay the better. Salarians provided a light cruiser, Citadel Fleet's sent a regular one and we even have the _Nomad_ on loan from the Turian Navy. Not to mention we've got all their escort fleets, too."

Valtha let out a low whistle, leaning back in her chair to look up at Nihlus and Larix. "Wait, they actually sent a Supercarrier out to back us up?"

"Uncharted relay exploration is no joke," Larix pointed out. "I mean, I doubt there's anything beyond that relay besides a few pirates considering the fact that the Sons of Kar'shan had regular contact with their new base of operations, but that doesn't mean this doesn't warrant a serious response."

"Still," Valtha muttered. "I've never seen an SC in action. Seems like kind of a waste to drag that sucker out here, just to have it watch us turn a few slavers into dust."

"Hey, you never know," Nihlus offered. ""Maybe we'll get to see it fire its main gun - it's a real treat, let me tell you. Anyways, I'll leave you guys to it - once they're here, we'll do a joint briefing with the other ships."

As it turned out, Nihlus barely had time to relax; he'd just returned to his bunk, left his guns on the nightstand and - not bothering to get out of his armour - had laid down for a nap when he jolted back into wakefulness. Raetor, Itok and Bekhamis - all fully geared up - were standing over him, helmets clipped to their belts and expectant looks on their faces.

"I just laid down for a nap," Nihlus grumbled. "They can't be here already."

"It's been two hours, boss," Itok pointed out cheerfully. "Also, you snore really loudly."

"You know that. Don't have to rub it in," Nihlus groused as he eased himself out of bed.

"Well, yeah, but Bekha didn't know that," Raetor added, nudging the batarian woman in the arm with his elbow. "Now she knows."

"Illuminating experience. You sleep with your mouth open, too. Should have taken some pictures," Bekhamis snorted. "Would have made for great blackmail."

"You're fitting in just fine, I see. Assholes." Nihlus strapped his guns to his armour and put on his helmet, rolling his neck once it sealed shut. "Come on, let's go say hello to our new best friends."

Together, the group rode the main elevator back up to the command deck, and entered the CIC to find Larix standing at his usual post overlooking the holotable; three holograms of a salarian, turian and asari were standing at attention, facing Larix.

"Apologies," Nihlus said as he jogged up to stand next to Larix on the command platform. "Thank you for waiting."

"It's quite alright, Spectre Kryik - we've only been waiting for a minute or so," the salarian captain said with an incline of his head. "I'm Captain Voniko of the _Anarchy_."

"Captain Idanis of the _Nomad_ ," the turian hologram added. "A pleasure to be working with you."

The asari captain smiled. "And I'm Captain Atruus of the _Discovery_."

"Well, I'm Spectre Nihlus Kryik, and this is Captain Quentis, who is in charge of ship operations aboard the _Lightspear Apex_. Just to make sure we're all on the same page, I understand that the Council has given me operational command of our mission. I won't pretend that I understand ship combat better than any of you," Nihlus noted, "so if I issue an order that sounds, in any way, to be of poor judgement, tell me. Otherwise, the plan is fairly simple - the _Lightspear Apex_ will go through the relay first with our full stealth package enabled."

"By itself?" Idanis interjected. "I understand that your ship is quite advanced in that regard, but if there are hostiles - pirate or otherwise - will your ship be capable of fending off a possibly overwhelming force?"

"I have full confidence in the capabilities of my crew," Larix replied. "At the very least, the _Lightspear_ and her crew would be able to get a message off before retreating or going into hiding."

"Fair enough," Idanis replied, frowning.

"The plan," Nihlus continued, "is for your ships to follow us through if we signal the all clear. If you don't hear from us within a few minutes, you can assume that something's gone wrong and send in scouts after us, contact the Citadel, et cetera. Does that sound acceptable?" The other captains made their assent clear, and Nihlus nodded. "We'll signal when we're ready to proceed. Thank you, captains."

Once the holograms disappeared and were replaced by the regular map display atop the holotable, Larix quickly punched a few orders into his omnitool, and MARCA's voice soon came from the ship's speakers.

"MARCA to all personnel, be advised. The _Lightspear Apex_ is entering uncharted space. Condition two. Repeat, condition two. Orders from Captain Quentis: Engineering, prepare to engage full stealth parameters and stand by to maximize matter-conversion reactor output. Gunnery, stand by on all hardpoints. Comm pit, stand by on stations. System alert: all AI subroutines shifting to combat mode. Minor terminal lag expected for the next three seconds...complete. Systems nominal. MARCA out."

The CIC filled with rustling, clicking noises as the crew began sealing hardsuits and putting on helmets; several new displays appeared on the holotable, showing external views from the ship's hull-mounted cameras and sensors. The _Lightspear Apex_ was holding position not far from the once-dormant relay, surrounded loosely by the three carriers and their escort fleets.

"Think we'll find anything interesting there?" Larix muttered, folding his arms. "With your luck we're going to run into five different alien species and also a sun going supernova."

"Your lack of faith in my track record hurts," Nihlus replied, chuckling. "You can't blame me for running into danger every day. I'm a Spectre. That's my job."

"I'm not blaming you, just complaining." Larix smiled slightly, eyes focused on the relay. "Force of habit. Time hono-"

"MARCA to all personnel, be advised. All stations report green. Control, stand by to initiate relay run," the AI interjected.

"Here we go," Larix said, eyes narrowing as he opened a channel to the carriers. " _Lightspear Apex_ to all ships, we are ready to begin our scouting operation. Stand by."

The ship rumbled for a moment as its various stealth systems engaged, and from the various external displays on the holoboard Nihlus watched as the _Lightspear Apex_ began moving towards the relay at low speed.

"MARCA to all personnel, be advised. Stealth systems online. Phase shifters, active. Infiltration cloak, active. Internal heatsinks engaged. Signals shielding, online. Approaching relay. Message from Flight Ops: activating relay in thirty seconds."

"Acquiring Relay jump vector."

"Calculating mass and destination."

"Relay acknowledges. All stations, secure for transit."

"On alignment. Relay is hot. Stand-by for transit in ten seconds."

"Five seconds."

Nihlus took a deep breath as a lance of blue-white light shot out from the mass relay.

"Initiating transit-"

-the entire ship began letting out a low groaning noise, and the hull seemed to reverberate with a loud, ear-piercing shriek as it faced some sort of unseen assault-

"-transit c-c-c-omple-ete," MARCA stuttered.

"STATUS!" Larix shouted as the external displays turned into static for a moment, alarms blaring at the flight stations.

"Calibration error. Soft reset required. Stand by," MARCA droned, its voice distinctly robotic and lacking its usual smoothness. "Resetting...complete. Systems check. Engineering reports all critical systems nominal, despite external sensor failure."

"VALTHA, ZERO RELATIVE STOP!" Larix shouted.

"Aye, Captain!" came Valtha's voice from Larix's comm. "Hard retro burn… indicators say we are at zero-zero-zero velocity relative to Relay. I'm flying blind."

"MARCA, what's wrong with our sensors?"

"Investigating. Unable to determine. Initiating hard reset to clear unknown interference. Complete. Sensor packages online."

The holoboard flickered as the sections closest to Larix rebooted, static clarifying into clarity.

Nobody said anything for a moment.

"What the fuck?" Itok shouted.

A massive, endless forest of blue floated in front of the _Lightspear Apex_ ; Nihlus wasn't sure what he was looking at for a split second, his mind unwilling to accept the obvious truth until MARCA spelled it out in its usual, calm voice.

"Assessment complete. At minimum four thousand, five hundred and sixty-seven relays of primary configuration, lay directly ahead of our ingress point to local space, within an volume of one light hour."

"What." Nihlus blinked over and over, shaking his head; there were indeed countless mass relays arranged in a haphazard manner in front of the ship, aimed in seemingly random directions and placed perilously close to one another. "What? Mass rela- how? What is this?"

"Message from Sensors," MARCA added. "High concentration of dark energy anomalies present in area. Furthermore, at least fifty percent of the mass relays present here have been activated. Their destination vectors are unknown."

"Spirits' shit," Larix hissed. "And - there are no planets? No celestial bodies? Where's the star?"

"None detected within effective scan range," MARCA replied. "Hypothesis: celestial bodies and/or planets eliminated due to high concentration of anomalous dark energy fields. Alternatively, anomaly fields are byproduct of catastrophic planet integrity failure."

Silence reigned for minutes.

"Comm pit, transmit all-clear to escort carriers," Larix managed in a voice that was almost free of hesitation. "Make sure they know about the sensor failure we experienced and let them know that, uh, we've found a lot of mass relays. Valtha, one light minute stand-off from the relay. Make room."

"Understood, Captain," Valtha replied, tone nervous.

"So," Nihlus murmured, mesmerized by the countless relays scattered before him on the holoboard's displays. "Better or worse than the supernova?"

"Worse," Larix grumbled, rubbing at his helmet's neck seal. "Way worse. Have fun explaining this to the Council.

* * *

 **CARRIER TEXT VECTOR ONLINE / READY / WAITING**

 _Priority transmission from Spectre Kryik to Council, Spectre Office._

 _Lightspear Apex and escort carriers / fleet completed transit through Primary Relay B/SV-314-Alpha with minor sensor issues. No evidence of batarian slaver group activity in 6 light hours volume surrounding B/SV-314-Beta; no celestial bodies or stars detected within 1 lightyear volume surrounding Beta relay . Lightspear Apex AI estimates four thousand plus mass relays in local space, in addition to high concentration of dark energy anomalies. We are holding position. Please advise._

 **SUBMIT SUBMIT SUBMIT SUBMIT SUBMIT SUBMIT SUBMIT**


End file.
